Staff Reporter :
The Officer-in-Charge (OC) and Assistant Sub-Inspector of Government Railway Police (GRP) Station in Khulna were withdrawn on Wednesday on charge of raping a woman at Khulna Railway Station.
Police Headquarters have withdrawn Khulna GRP OC Osman Gani and ASI Nazmul Haq for their involvement in the gang rape of a woman in custody.
Kushtia Railway Circle Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Firoz Ahmed, who is heading a committee to probe the allegation, told the reporters on Wednesday. OC Osman Gani Pathan and ASI Nazmul Haque were closed at Paksey Railway Division as per the order of Mohammad Nazrul Islam, Superintendent of Police (SP) of Paksey Railway Police, the police official said.
The two officials were closed in order to keep the probe influence-free, he said. The OC was named an accused when the victim filed a complaint in this regard with the district’s Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate’s Court on Sunday.
Earlier on Monday, Khulna police formed the three-member committee to investigate a woman’s gang-rape allegedly committed by five members of the police, including OC Osman. On the night of August 2, Railway police detained the woman, a mother of three children, when she was coming to Khulna from Jashore by train, on allegations of stealing a mobile phone.
On August 3, police presented her in a court in a drug case, with five bottles of contraband cough syrup Phensidyl. However on August 4, the woman told the court that she was first raped by OC Osman while in custody at Khulna Government Railway Police Station, and then by four other policemen.
To verify her statement, the court ordered a medical check-up for her at Khulna Medical College Hospital (KMCH).
It was also claimed that OC Osman bribed the woman’s family in order to cover up the alleged crime.
The woman was detained inside a train by railway police in Phultala Railway Station. She was then forced to disembark and was taken to Khulna Railway Station, said the victim’s sister. At the station, the first to rape her was OC Osman. After him, the other policemen took turns in raping her.
The next day, the alleged rapists filed a case against the victim for possessing five bottles of Phensidyl, after which a court sent her to jail. On Sunday, the victim filed a bail petition with the district’s additional chief judicial magistrate’s court and filed the complaint against the policemen, the sister said.
Atiqus Samad, Judicial Magistrate of the court, ordered a medical test of the woman to verify her statement. She was taken to Khulna Medical College Hospital for a test and later sent to jail on Monday.
Contacted, the OC denied the allegations and claimed he was not present at the police station that night.
