New Delhi: The Uttarakhand government Friday gave the green light for the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to conduct a fresh probe into the 2022 murder of 19-year-old Ankita Bhandari, yielding to protests and demands after allegations surfaced on the involvement of a “VIP” .
A statement issued by the government said: “Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, respecting the request and sentiments of the parents of late Ankita Bhandari, has approved the recommendation for a CBI investigation into the Ankita Bhandari case.”
The government’s objective has always been to ensure justice in a fair, transparent, and sensitive manner from the very beginning, and this commitment will continue in the future as well, it added.
“I met and had a word with the parents of late Ankit Bhandari, and respecting their request and sentiments, we are recommending a CBI investigation into the case,” CM Dhami said in a video statement Friday.
Under the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946, which governs the central agency’s jurisdiction, a state government must grant consent for the CBI to investigate a case registered by state police. The central government’s Department of Personnel & Training will now issue a notification authorising the agency to formally take up the probe.
Bhandari was working as a receptionist at a resort near Rishikesh when she was killed in September 2022. A Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Uttarakhand Police, formed to probe the case, arrested the resort’s owner Pulkit Arya, the son of a former BJP MLA, and two of his associates soon after. The three were convicted and handed life terms by a local court in May last year.
The case returned to the spotlight in recent weeks after actor Urmila Sanawar, the estranged partner of now-expelled BJP leader Suresh Rathore, released audio clips of a purported conversation between them. In the clips, a man is heard identifying the “VIP” at the resort as BJP general secretary and Uttarakhand in-charge Dushyant Gautam.
Gautam has since denied the accusation and filed a defamation case against Sanawar, Rathore and three Opposition parties for linking him to the murder.
Still, the claims triggered another round of protests and renewed demands by Bhandari’s parents to conduct a CBI investigation. Many within the BJP also questioned Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami’s handling of the matter and backed calls for a CBI probe.
“The controversy had dented the image of Dhami as a decisive leader, and the fact that he met the parents only after several protests shows that he was not able to gauge the magnitude of the problem,” a BJP leader said.
Former cabinet minister Vijaya Barthwal earlier this week called for an “impartial investigation by CBI, so that there is no possibility of any kind of political pressure or concealment”.
Another senior BJP leader said it was “too sensitive a matter”.
“The way it was handled was simply not right. Transparency is something that everyone has been pitching for, and with elections just around the corner, the Opposition was politicising it too,” the leader said, referring to Congress’s statewide protest.
Uttarakhand is expected to go to the polls early next year.
The ‘missing’ details
While the Uttarakhand Police investigation led to convictions, the SIT never probed in detail the allegations made by Bhandari’s friends that she was being pressured into providing “extra services” to VIPs, and that she’d refused.
Hours after police had arrested Pulkit Arya for the murder, CM Dhami ordered the demolition of his Vanantra resort. Congress has alleged this was done hastily to destroy evidence.
Police also could not recover Bhandari’s mobile phone, which was allegedly used to send WhatsApp messages to her friends, including the one referring to a “VIP visiting the resort”.
Bhandari’s parents, at the meeting with the CM in Dehradun this week, also demanded identification of the “VIP” allegedly involved in the case. They said the Chief Minister had assured them their demands would be considered.
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