The Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the Dharmasthala case arrested the whistleblower in the case on August 23.
The whistleblower had appeared before SIT chief Pranab Mohanty on August 22 and recorded his statement. According to sources, he told investigators that most of the burials he carried out in Dharmasthala were legal ones after post mortem, while reiterating that there were a few illegal ones. An SIT source said that since the whistleblower had told a magistrate that all burials were illegal and is taking back that statement, it amounts to perjury.
On July 11, the whistleblower had handed over skeletal remains of a body that he had allegedly exhumed to the police. The skeletal remains he presented to the court are believed to not be from Dharmasthala and were probably from a laboratory , according to the SIT sources. “For this reason, he has been booked under the charge of creating false evidence,” an SIT officer said.
The whistleblower’s claims of being forced to bury multiple bodies of women and children who appeared to have been sexually assaulted had prompted the SIT probe earlier in July. Excavation work by the team has so far led to the recovery of a skeleton and a few human bones at two spots. The SIT source said these recoveries will be investigated, and that soil samples from identified spots have been sent for chemical and forensic testing to check for the potential presence of more human remains in the area.
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