Top cop comes out and says the police investigation has proven that there was no gang-rape, and that the complainant inflicted the injury on himself
Sanjay Kumar, police chief, Navi Mumbai
Navi Mumbai police on Friday said the injuries sustained by a 34-year-old man, who alleged rape by five men, were self-inflicted and ruled out sexual assault. The man had gone to the police on September 24, saying he was gang-raped in a secluded area in Vashi and that the rapists inserted a coconut inside him. He and his family refused to comment on the police's statement.
The surgeon who attended to the man immediately after the incident even on Friday maintained that the injuries were consistent with sexual assault. The police however said the man has "confessed to the act of inserting the coconut into himself" and that they will conduct a psychological evaluation on him soon.
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"We have studied his Call Data Records (CDR) which reveal he has been regularly visiting the area where he earlier claimed to have been gang-raped by unknown people," said Sanjay Kumar, commissioner, Navi Mumbai. "It is not the first time that he visited the spot (an abandoned building), and indeed he is habitual in this activity of inserting coconut into himself."
Police sources told mid-day that investigators have recovered nearly 40 coconuts wrapped in several layers of condoms, with one end tied with a long piece of cloth, "possibly to pull it out from the rectum to gain sexual pleasure".
"This time, the cloth snapped and he panicked," said an officer who was part of the probe. "He approached his family physician and later went to a private hospital as he was in deep pain. He, possibly, cooked up the story to avoid social stigma as he is a married man."
Deputy Commissioner of Police Pankaj Dahane said his investigators have enough evidence to prove that the man misled the police. "We will file a B-Summary report in the case," said Dahane.
A B-Summary report is filed when the police do not find any evidence against an accused to seek trial. Dahane said the likelihood of the police filing a case against the complainant for false complaint "is unlikely".
The police are planning to record the man's confessional statement before a magistrate, but considering his current mental state, investigators said they will wait for a few days.
"He had made a very serious allegation of being gang-raped," said an officer, explaining why they need to record his statement before a magistrate. "The entire police machinery was put on work, but now he has confessed, saying that it was self-inflicted. But if he backtracks in court, our investigation will come back to square one." The medical practitioner Dr. Prakash Shendge, who conducted the surgery on the complainant, and who has been telling since day one that the injury marks reveal that the "act was not consensual" stuck to his guns. "It is a medico-legal case," said Shengde. "I won't be abe to speak much about it but the survivor told me that he was gang-raped and now he has given a statement to police saying it was self-inflicted, though the injury mark suggests that the sex was not consensual."
The man's friends said they were shocked by the police's revelations. They had backed their friend and had petitioned the commissioner, seeking a thorough probe and quick arrest of the perpetrators. "All of us are shocked," said Shailendra Singh, a childhood friend of the complainant, who is still recuperating in the hospital. "We did not know our childhood friend was misguiding the investigators. We had been asking him to reveal the truth but he always maintained it was a gang rape."
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