It was that dark day for a family in Ghatkopar who had just sent their 3-year old daughter to get a chocolate for herself from the adjoining general store. Little did they know that the toddler who was looking forward to the sweetness in the goody ended up tasting the bitterness of the sexual predators of the society that led to her death. Baby Gudiya, a 3-year-old girl belonging to the area of Ghatkopar of Mumbai was brutally raped and murdered after which her body was tossed off onto a pile of garbage. The incident dates back to October 7, 2015, much before the current cases of Kathua and Unnao surfaced, but somehow the case faded into nothingness given the negligence of Mumbai Police and the sloppy law and order of the state.
A run-up to Baby Gudiya’s rape case:
The horrendous incident is of Bhattwadi in Ghatkopar. On the evening of 7 October 2015, baby Gudiya playfully went out to buy chocolate from a nearby shop for herself. But as couple of hours went ticking and the little girl did not return home, her parents started getting anxious. But even worse, the evening went by and it was night when Gudiya’s both parents, Laxmi her mother and Nagesh her father went ahead filing a missing complaint at the local Chiragnagar police station of Ghatkopar. Bringing all their hopes together in vain, they kept on reckoning that their little girl would soon return home, only to find her corpse lying on the heap of garbage on 9 October 2015.
Is there any accused?
The case seems to be a forgotten issue in the minds of the Mumbai Police. When HW News Network had earlier inquired, DCP Sachin Patil had assured that he would leave no stones unturned to make sure Gudiya’s family gets justice but when we intervened 6 months back, Police Inspector Venkat Patil said that there’s no way forward.
Where is the justice?
What may come across to be even more appalling is the fact that the copies of both the FIR and the autopsy report were never handed over to Gudiya’s family. It was post HW News Network‘s intervention 6 months back, that Gudiya’s family got a copy of the FIR. Worse still, the police instead thought Gudiya’s uncle and father to be the prime suspect in the case, hence turning the tables for the little girl’s family as if her untimely death wasn’t just enough to bring the family’s life to a standstill, bringing in that permanent vacuum which can never be filled. To deteriorate the matter, the family who has to toil every day to earn its two-square meals in a day, was compelled to starve themselves as they had to keep running to the police station just so they could seek justice but the police kept on brushing the case aside under the carpet exhibiting their negligence to no avail.
Why not the case was handed over to the CBI?
For everyone who has been quoting that the law is only for those who can afford good lawyers is not figuratively but literally holds true in this case. The voices of both Baby Gudyiya’s parents seemed to have not reached the law system or in simpler words, the administration chose to give deaf ears to their voices. The accused is still wandering somewhere free onto the streets of the city only making it appear that in today’s epoch it is this convenient to rape and murder a toddler and get away with it like nobody’s business. This case by any stretch of imagination is a clear instance that if it is this tedious for the family to get their hands on the accused by way of local police, to get justice from the CBI will be only akin to shooting for the moon.
Senior Advocate Rizwan Merchant’s opinion on the case:
Advocate Rizwan Merchant says, “Baby Gudiya’s matter is a case of rape and murder. As per the post-mortem report, the three-year-old was raped and it has been mentioned that she had suffered a brain haemorrhage before dying. It is very evident that the police had ignored the matter right from the start. The police personnel who are working, in this case, do not have any right whatsoever to sit in their respective chairs. Ideally, this case should have been registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. Instead, the crime has been registered under section 363(kidnapping). The question here arises that what were the investigating officers doing up till now? Knowing that nothing has been found in the investigation so far, this case should have been entrusted to the CBI. The police administration is completely responsible for this delay; hence it is imperative that this case is thoroughly investigated. Chances are that the accused might have fled the city or worse the country. It is critical that the victim’s clothes should be tested. The case has been delayed since the officer did not record kidnapping and rape in the FIR.
Questions to be raised:
Why were the copies of the post-mortem and FIR not handed over to Baby Gudiya’s parents?
Why was the case of rape not registered in the FIR?
Why is it that the police are still saying that they still need to investigate the case?
Why is it that the case has not been handed over to CBI?
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