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Chandigarh University case: Videos of other girls not on armyman’s phone: Police
The army man also told the cops that he had been chatting with the Chandigarh University student under the assumed identity of Rankaj Verma.
Chandigarh While police personnel have found some personal videos shared by the Chandigarh University student accused of recording objectionable videos of boarders in the common washroom on the phone of the main accused, none of the videos feature other hostellers.
The main accused, Sanjeev Kumar, an army man, who was arrested from Arunachal Pradesh on September 24, was produced in court on Monday with three other co-accused, Sunny Mehta, Rankaj Verma and the Chandigarh University student. The four accused were sent to a five-day police remand. The cops, however, were seeking a seven-day police remand so that they could cross-examine them.
A police officer, who did not wish to be named, said, “Sanjeev tried to erase evidence from his phone, but we were able to retrieve the data. Prima facie, the accused only shared her own videos with Sanjeev. We have sent the phone to the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) to ascertain whether videos of other girls were shared with him or not,” the officer said.
Notably, the police had on September 18 claimed that only one private video of the arrested student had surfaced in the case. However, the next day, the police had told the court that they had found the video of another girl, which had been filmed in the hostel washroom, but it was not “objectionable” in nature.
Was misusing co-accused’s photo
The army man also told the cops that he had been chatting with the Chandigarh University student under the assumed identity of Rankaj Verma. He said he had used Rankaj’s photograph, which he had downloaded from a social media application, to interact with the arrested woman, whom he had befriended on social media.
He told the court that he had never met Rankaj Verma, a co-accused in the case, and that the latter had nothing to do with the case.
A police officer, who did not wish to be named, said, “The number (included in the first information report) with which the student had shared the videos was being used by Sanjeev.”
Asserting that the statement proved his client’s innocence, Verma’s counsel Harjinder Singh Johal said, “He (Verma) has never met any of the accused. He has also lodged a complaint with the police saying that his photograph was being misused by unidentified miscreants.”
However, the police have not given Verma the clean chit just yet. “Verma’s involvement in the case is still being probed,” the police officer cited above said.
Classes resume at CU
After remaining closed for six days after national outrage over the video leak case, final-year students resumed classes on Monday. Classes for second-year and third-year students will resume on September 28 and first-year students will resume classes on October 3.
