TV
Recently, "Reclaim the Night" movement marked a month since a 31-year-old postgraduate resident doctor was found raped and murdered at the state-run RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata on August 9, 2024. The incident sent shockwaves across the country with junior doctors staging protests to press for justice for the victim.
From lapses in the probe to handing over the case to the CBI and hearing in the Supreme Court, a lot happened in the past one month with several parties slamming the West Bengal government headed by CM Mamata Banerjee.
People across the country are standing in solidarity with the family of the victim and hoping for justice and the harshest punishment for those involved. With the junior doctors continuing with their agitation, the West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee on Thursday apologised to the people.
Though the CM said that she is ready to resign for people’s sake after talks with junior doctors ended in deadlock, West Bengal Governor CV Ananda Bose said he will not share any public platform with CM Mamata Banerjee in view of people's outcry over the RG Kar impasse.
Under such circumstances, will the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee resign? Well, it is difficult to say anything what turn the sensational case and the outrage take from here.
Meanwhile, the ongoing battle for justice in Kolkata has reminded people of a gang rape case that led to the ouster of a government in Odisha. We are talking about the sensational Anjana Mishra gang rape case of 1999. The incident had then triggered widespread outrage apart from kicking off a political storm.
Subsequently, it is said that the heinous incident also contributed to the fall of the then Congress government led by Janaki Ballabh Patnaik.
The survivor Anjana is still fighting a lone battle, even though one of the prime accused Biban alias Bibekananda Biswal, who was on the run, was nabbed from Pune in Maharashtra after 22 years in 2021. Biban was nabbed by a special team of Commissionerate Police even though the sensational case is being probed by the CBI.
The Commissionerate Police had then claimed that it managed to pull the prime accused Biban from the hole after an intense operation which was code-named, ‘Silent Viper’.
The prime accused Biban had changed his name and was working as a plumber in Maharashtra. He had hidden himself at Aamby Vally in Pune by changing his name to Jalandhar Swain and was working there as a plumber.
A Flash Back
Anjana Mishra, the separated wife of an Indian forest service officer, was gang raped on January 9, 1999 in Barang area of Cuttack district. Mishra was travelling in a car with one of her journalist friends when the vehicle was stopped at an isolated place near Barang by three persons, including the prime accused Biban. She was gang raped in front of her friend at gunpoint.
Operation Silent Viper
Years passed and suddenly out of nowhere, the Commissionerate Police led by the then Police Commissioner Sudhanshu Sarangi and his team came up with the surprise. The police announced to have laid their hands on the prime accused in the sensational Anjana Mishra gang rape case from Maharashtra. Earlier, two other accused were nabbed barely 17 days of the gang rape case. However, the prime accused Biban managed to remain on the run for almost 22 years until the Commissionerate police busted his hideout in 2021.
The then Police Commissioner while briefing media about the operation 'silent viper' had said that he met one of the accused Dhirendra Mohanty in Choudwar jail. He then asked him about Biban Biswal (the third and prime accused in the case) but did not get any clue.
According to the then Police Commissioner, he went through the old files and found that Biban was the main accused in the case and the other two (Dhirendra and Padia Sahu) were his mere associates who had helped him in the crime. Later, it was learnt that Biban was referred to as BK and the acronym stood for ' Barang King' as called by his associates.
It was then that the case was reopened and soon the cops got credible lead. Police came to know that Biban would often send money to his family and even visited his village- Naranpur in Barang area occasionally. It was then that the police came to know about a person named Jalandhar Swain. The evidence later turned out a major lead after police learnt that Biban's sons were trying to apply for a death certificate in the name of Jalandhar Swain.
Odisha Politics Following the Gang Rape
Following massive public outcry, the then Chief Minister JB Patnaik resigned on moral grounds in February 1999. He was then replaced by Giridhar Gamang. However, in the very next year in 2020, the party lost the elections and Naveen Patnaik’s BJD which was formed just three years earlier formed the government in Odisha. It is believed that the mishandling of the 1999 super cyclone along with the Anjana Mishra gang rape case led to the fall of the Congress government in Odisha and the party could hardly recover from the jolts.
