Ranchi: At Ranchi’s Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences, Sunita Xaxa lies on a hospital bed with a saline drip inserted in her left hand and two female constables standing guard to her right.
For three years, the 29-year-old faced horrific torture, allegedly at the hands of her employer — suspended BJP leader Seema Patra — at the latter’s posh Ashok Nagar residence, where she worked as a domestic help.
According to a statement Sunita gave to a magistrate from her hospital bed Tuesday, Patra allegedly beat her up, used hot utensils to burn her skin, and broke her teeth with iron rods. She also allegedly locked Sunita up in a room for days without food.
Her arms are covered with blood clots, but Sunita still dreams of a better life. “I want to study further after I get well,” she says. Unable to keep her eyes open for long, however, she dozes off. The conversation remains incomplete.
She appears so weak, that she is unable to even turn in bed without the help of a nurse.
Patra, wife of retired IAS officer Maheshwar Patra, was suspended by the BJP Monday, soon after news of Sunita’s case appeared in the news. On Wednesday, the Jharkhand Police arrested her for alleged physical abuse of her domestic help. She has been remanded to 14 days’ judicial custody.
Ranchi Senior Superintendent of Police Kishor Kaushal told ThePrint that the suspended BJP leader has been booked under sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 325 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt), 346 (wrongful confinement) and 374 (unlawful compulsory labour) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), as well as relevant sections of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Patra has reportedly claimed that the charges against her are “false and politically motivated”.
Interestingly, it was Patra’s son, Ayushman, who finally helped Sunita. Tormented by her condition, he reached out to his friend, Vivek Baskey, a Jharkhand government employee, who called in the police.
Baskey is also the complainant in the case. ThePrint has a copy of the FIR.
Remembering his friend’s call in the late hours of 2 August, Baskey told ThePrint, “Ayushman’s voice was shaking. He asked me to save Sunita. Suddenly I saw his mother was calling me too. She said Ayushman was not well. I drove down to their house, but wasn’t allowed to enter. That’s when I started suspecting something was wrong.”
On 22 August, he finally filed a police complaint, leading to Sunita’s rescue, he said.
ThePrint reached Ayushman over phone and text messages Thursday, but received no response till the time of publication of this report.
Ayushman, Baskey said, had shared with him earlier photographs of Sunita as well as recent ones, in which she was “unrecognisable”.
“It was my moral duty as a citizen to help. Sunita had not seen sunlight for five-six years, she was kicked, tortured and a rolling pin was used to choke her,” said the Jharkhand government employee.
According to Baskey, Sunita initially worked at Patra’s daughter’s house in Delhi, but was later sent to work at the suspended BJP leader’s home in Ranchi.
Baskey said he meets Sunita daily at the hospital and ensures her treatment is on track. He has also helped connect Sunita to a local NGO in Ranchi, which is now providing basic needs like clothes, dry food, toiletries for her during this recovery period, he claimed.
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In the FIR registered on his police complaint on 22 August, Baskey claimed that Ayushman had also spoken to his wife Rashmi George over phone, requesting them to save the help.
“He (Ayushman) pleaded since the maid is a tribal and so am I, the rescue will be possible. He said his mother was planning to take her maid, who was not in good health and had defecated and urinated in her dress, to Varanasi to get rid of her. He said, his mother could also wrap her in a blanket and throw her on the roadside or in an isolated place,” Baskey claimed, according to the FIR.
Baskey and Ayushman had also been making video recordings of Sunita’s alleged abuse at the hands of Patra, the Jharkhand government employee told ThePrint. These clips were later aired on news channels, triggering calls for Patra’s arrest.
While Ayushman was pleading with his friend to save the domestic help, his mother reportedly got him admitted to a psychiatric institute after he objected to Sunita’s alleged abuse.
The suspended BJP leader’s social media pages claim her to be an active BJP member.
Her Facebook bio says “state convenor, Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, BJP Jharkhand Morcha.
Beti Bachao Beti Padhao is a BJP-led central government initiative for the welfare of the girl child, launched back in 2015.
Patra’s Twitter bio reads, “Member National Working Committee, Mahila Morcha, State in-charge, policy and research.”
(Edited by Poulomi Banerjee)
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