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Accused ‘mentally sound’: Odisha court in minister Naba Das’ murder case
The dismissed police ASI shot dead the minister from a close range in Brajarajnagar town of Jharsuguda on January 29 afternoon
Three days after turning down CID’s request to take him to the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences in Bengaluru for evaluation, a sessions court in Jharsuguda district has now said in an order that dismissed ASI Gopal Das, accused of killing Odisha health minister Naba Kishore Das, is mentally sound.
The additional district and sessions judge on March 3 denied permission to the CID to take Das to NIMHANS.
Quoting the report of the medical board that comprised experts from the state-run SCB Medical College and Hospital, the court said, “(The accused) was conscious, alert, co-operative and communicative. He is well groomed with eye-to-eye contact. Rapport is established. Mood and affect-appropriate to the situation. Speech is relevant, coherent and goal directed. Thought content-no abnormality, perception-no abnormality, orientation-intact, memory-immediate, recent, remote all intact, judgment-intact, intelligence-average, Abstract thinking-intact, insight present.”
The court noted that “nowhere in the observation made by the medical board it is found that the accused is suffering from mental illness”.
Gopal’s advocate Hari Shankar Agarwal said, “We pleaded that if his mental state is good and the medical board has confirmed this, what is the need of his (Gopal’s) further examination.”
The dismissed police ASI shot dead the minister from a close range in Brajarajnagar town of Jharsuguda on January 29 afternoon when the latter was stepping out of his car to address a meeting. The bullet pierced the minister’s heart and he was declared dead 10 hours later at a hospital in Bhubaneswar.
Also Read:Odisha court rejects CID plea to take health minister murder accused to NIMHANS
As opposition parties in Odisha continue to allege that there was deep-rooted conspiracy behind the murder, chief minister Naveen Patnaik last month announced in the assembly that the state government has sought the help of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States of America for its expertise in behavioural analysis of the accused.
Congress MLA Tara Prasad Bahinipati alleged that the killing was a ‘planned murder’ while fellow party leader and MLA Santosh Singh Saluja demanded that BJD MLA Sushant Singh be also probed.
Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Janata Party has demanded a CBI investigation into the incident.
