The police are duty bound not to act as caged parrots but to diligently investigate each and every crime, however the sordid ground reality is there for all to see. If the same keenness and enthusiasm being shown in the current MLA Babush Monserrate case was displayed by the Goa Police in the 14th January 2013 Vasco rape case of that 7 year old little girl, the rapist would have been nabbed.
After that girl was mercilessly raped in the school toilet the police though in the neighbourhood reached after three long hours while the school staff high-handedly washed away all the evidence. The victim girl received medical attention only eight hours after she was brutally raped while she got counseling only 15 days later. The little girl’s family may have been very poor but justice should not have eluded them.
What was however very shattering was that despite this heinous crime against a 7 year old, the then Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar did not care to visit the victim and her grieving family. It was horrendous that he dared show such insensitivity while the police methodically botched up the probe to hush up the case in order to shield the politically influential alleged rapist.
We have also seen the case of the orphan who was raped at Colva by an influential model. The police did a half baked shoddy investigation enabling the accused to get a discharge. The police later did not challenge that discharge due to which the victim had to herself knock the doors of the High Court and the trial is now again underway.
Despite having some very talented officers the Goa Police including the Crime Branch have a very dismal conviction rate which speaks volumes for its manner and methodology of investigation. The much hyped Tarun Tejpal and the more recent Louis Berger case are ending up a damp squib. We shall have to await to see the fate of this Babush Monserrate saga as there are more questions than answers on the manner the probe is geared and targeted. Will it be another case where public money is being poured down the drain on a politically driven probe leading nowhere? The Government cannot be using the police machinery for witch hunting and to settle political scores. Is the Police machinery, with select officers being assigned special tasks, to suit their political masters? Is this the blue print in the run-up to the 2017 Assembly elections?
