Madikeri: Two years after Dy.SP Madappanda K. Ganapathy was found hanging at a lodge in Madikeri, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is likely to submit its report to the Supreme Court by this month end. Sources told Star of Mysore that the CBI is reaching final stages of its investigation and the report will be submitted to the top court by the end of July.
M.K. Ganapathy had allegedly killed himself wearing his uniform at room number 315 at Vinayaka Lodge in Madikeri on July 7, 2016, after appearing in a local TV channel interview in which he had alleged harassment by K.J. George, the then Home Minister (present IT, BT Minister) and two senior IPS Officers A.M. Prasad and Pronab Mohanty.
After many twists and turns, even as the State Government rejected a CBI probe, based on the family plea, the Supreme Court, on September 5, 2017, ordered the CBI to investigate the death. The CID had given clean chit to Minister George, Pronab Mohanty and Prasad.
Supreme Court Bench of Justices A.K. Goel and U.U. Lalit had said there were “startling” facts in the case which needed to be thoroughly probed in a fair manner to find out whether it was a case of murder or suicide. “We are not determining the nature of the offence or who is guilty. But public confidence and societal requirement demand that the guilty persons must be reached,” the Bench said.
The Court passed the order on a petition filed by Ganapathy’s father M.K. Kushalappa seeking a CBI probe. The Court also noted that the Officer had openly accused a Minister and two high-ranking Police Officers of harassment and had said if anything happened to him, only they should be held responsible.
Taking over the investigation, the CBI teams headed by Additional SP Kalaimani and Inspector Dilip from Chennai had visited Madikeri a couple of times. The team even found a bullet inside the room where Ganapathy’s body was found.
Examining the room inch-by-inch, forensic experts and the CBI team found the bullet on the bed. Out of the 10 rounds in Ganapathy’s 9 mm service pistol, two bullets were fired and the empty cartridges were found during the initial mahazar conducted by the Police and the CID. The CBI found one more bullet giving rise to many theories and speculations.
Amidst allegations by Opposition-BJP that the investigations by the State Police were botched up, the recovery of a new bullet from the crime scene nearly a year-and-a-half after the incident, raised many questions.
The CBI found anomalies in the post-mortem report of the deceased Police Officer. The CBI which recorded the statement of Dr. Shailaja, who conducted the post-mortem at the District Hospital in Madikeri, is said to have questioned the doctor on the anomalies found in the report. Dr. Shailaja is said to have told the CBI sleuths that she was asked by the Government to conduct the post-mortem treating it only as a suicide case.
The FIR filed by the CBI had named K.J. George as the first accused and IPS Officer Pronab Mohanty and A.M. Prasad as the second and third accused respectively.
This post was published on July 7, 2018 6:42 pm