Sister Abhaya murder case

Sister Abhaya
File:Sisterabhaya.JPG
Born	1971 Kottayam, Kerala
Died	March 27 1992

Sister Abhaya murder case concerns a nun, who was found dead in a water well in St Pius X convent in Kottayam, India, on 27 March 1992. She was 21 years old at the time of her death and was a member of St. Joseph's Congregation for women under the Catholic diocese of Kottayam, Kerala in India.

Background of the case

Sister Abhaya, daughter of M. Thomas in Areekara, in Kottayam District was a second year pre-degree student in B.C.M. college in 1992, at Kottayam which belonged to the diocese of Kottayam and was a resident of St. Pius X^th Convent, which is situated within the city limits. The convent also provided lodging and boarding for university girl students. She was said to be of good habits, normal behaviour, maintained healthy and cordial friendship as per hostel rules and with all the inmates and absolutely had no mental disorder or any psychological aberration.

On 27 March 1992, in the wee hours of the day, she was found dead in the water well of the Convent. There was no convincing answer from any quarter for the mysterious death of Abhaya. What people gathered from the nuns of the Convent was that she may have committed suicide due to mental disorder.

Action council

The parents of Abhaya were economically very poor and had no political or social influence to pursue the matter. However, the many who really believed that it was a murder, formed an Action Council on 31 March 1992 and sent a plea to all concerned - the Chief Minister of the state, the Prime Minister, the President, the Chief Justice of the High Court of Kerala, the Director General of Police and so on - demanding prosecution of the culprits for the murder of Abhaya. The local police who first investigated the matter could not bring out any evidence to prove murder.

It is said to be because of the consistent and persistent representations by the Action Council, the Director General of Police of Kerala on 7 April 1992 directed the Crime Branch section of the Kerala Police to take up the investigation from the local police. The Crime Branch submitted its report before the Sub-Divisional Magistrate (RDO) on 30 January 1993, according to which Abhaya had committed suicide. The Crime Branch had nothing more to say than what was explained by the nuns in the beginning.

In the meantime, the Action Council had approached the High Court of Kerala, invoking its special jurisdiction in a writ petition for an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the highest investigating agency in India.

Various investigations

Kerala police

Initially, the local police investigated the case wrote it off as suicide, based on postmortem report. It is widely believe that they are forced to destroy key evidences such as the nun’s clothes and other personal belongings during the investigation due to some forces were trying to influence the investigation. (Later, the former police official, who investigated the murder and closed it as a case of suicide, had undergone Narco Analysis test in 2007). During the initial inquiry, the postmortem, chemical examination and laboratory report also had been erased and then rewritten due to other influence. Reports also indicated that some laboratory officials did not willing to cooperate with police during the initial inquiry.

Crime branch

On 7 April 1992, the Director General of Police of Kerala directed the Crime Branch section of the Kerala police to take up the investigation due to relentless protest by the Action Council. The Crime Branch submitted its report before the Sub-Divisional Magistrate (RDO) on 30 January 1993. However, as per the report, the Crime Branch had nothing more to say than what was explained by the local police as they too had reached the conclusion that she had committed suicide.

CBI

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), India's premier investigating agency, started investigating the unnatural death of Sister Abhaya on 29 March 1993, under the direct supervision of its officer Varghese P. Thomas. He was then serving as deputy superintendent (DSP) of CBI. While the CBI investigation was in progress, the Superintendent of Crime Branch, K.T. Michael, who initially investigated and reported the death as "suicide", obtained written permission from the RDO (Rural Development Officer) to take possession of Abhaya's personal articles - her veil, chappels, personal diary and such other personal goods that are of high evidenciary value from the RDO court. The whereabouts of all those items which has been considered as critical evidences, are found missing now.

DSP’s controversial resignation

Surprisingly, on 30 December 1993, Varghese P. Thomas resigned from the service of CBI and from the investigation of Abhaya's death. He had seven more years in service to retire. Varghese P.Thomas was a brilliant and honest police officer and for his meritorious services he was awarded the prestigious President's National Medal. He had finally arrived at the conclusion that Abhaya's death was a clear case of murder and he had recorded it as such in the CBI Diary. Subsequently on 19 January 1994, he called a special press conference in Cochin and announced that he had resigned from CBI as his conscience did not permit him to comply with a strong directive given by his superior officer, V. Thyagarajan, the then Superintendent of CBI Cochin Unit, who had asked Varghese P. Thomas to record the death of Abhaya as suicide in the CBI Diary. With this press conference, the case of Sr.Abhaya caught media attention all over India and the matter was strongly debated in the parliament as well as in the Kerala state assembly on several occasions.

Moving to High Court

The Action Council filed another Writ petition in the Kerala High Court asking the court to remove V. Thyagarajan from Cochin Unit of the CBI as well as from the investigation. Further on 3 June 1994 all the MP's from Kerala State jointly submitted a passionate petition to K. Vijaya Rama Rao, the Director of the CBI requesting him to disallow Thyagarajan to continue in the Abhaya's murder case. As a result M.L. Sharma, the Joint Director of the CBI, was given charge of the investigation into Abhaya's death.

The role of V. Thyagarajan in the distortion of Abhaya's case was apparent in the High Court when Varghese P. Thomas produced an original copy of a report sent by V. Thyagarajan to the Joint Director of the CBI suggesting that further investigation into the death of Sr. Abhaya should be dropped, despite the death being recorded in the CBI Diary as MURDER by Varghese P.Thomas after due consideration of the material facts of the case. As a result, Thyagarajan was transferred to Chennai Unit of CBI.

CBI's dummy test

On the 7 April 1995, using a full-sized dummy of Sister Abhaya, the CBI made some experimental tests in the well where her corpse was found. By that time, on 17 April 1995 Dr. S.K. Patak, the chief of the Forensic Department of Saiman Singh Medical college, Jaipur and Dr. Mahesh Varma, former chairperson of Anatomy Section submitted their formal expert report to the CBI investigation team to the effect that her death was clearly murder. Subsequently the CBI declared that the killers would soon be arrested.

Protest continuing

But nothing happened. No-one was arrested. The investigation itself was limping without a clear aim before then. Hence the Action Council staged a protest in front of the CBI office at Cochin on 27 November 1995 against the callousness of the CBI and its lack of orientation. Later on 18 March 1996 another big rally was organised under the former chief minister of the state, E.K. Nayanar, in front of the state secretariate, at Thiruvananthapuram, the state capital. Again on 1 July 1996 the Action Council filed a petition in the High Court challenging the inaction of the CBI. The High Court passed an order in the petition on 20 August 1996 directing the CBI to complete its investigation in three months from the date of the order. In the meantime, the CBI declared an award of Rs 300,000 to whoever gives dependable evidence in the case of Abhaya.

On 12 October 1996 all the MPs from Kerala together visited the Prime Minister and jointly pleaded with him to expedite the CBI investigation into the death of Abhaya. However, on 6 December 1996 the CBI filed a petition in the Chief Judicial Magistrate's court, Ernakulam, seeking permission of the court to wind up its investigation in the matter. In response to that, the father of Sr.Abhaya, Thomas, filed a counter petition in the court on 18 January 1997 to dismiss the final report of the CBI and its recommendation for closure of investigation.

Court criticizing CBI

The Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) directed the CBI in its order dated 20 March 1997 to re-investigate the case. The court in its order strongly criticized the CBI for its loyalty and complicity to certain vested interests to defeat the ends of justice and the court observed that the CBI had not made party some very significant persons who otherwise emerged in the facts of the case quite evidently. The court also asserted its belief that the case could have easily been established had there been an honest and proper investigation. Further the court took very serious exception to the role of the Crime Branch officers, mentioning K.T. Michael by name for the distorted course of investigation from the beginning. The court has observed that certain "invisible hands" were still trying to scuttle the Sister Abhaya murder case observing that these forces were trying to influence the investigating agencies and the government officials.

High Court’s new intervention

The Action Council, again on 30 May 1997 filed a Public Interest Litigation in the High Court of Kerala against the non-compliance of the CJM's directive for re-investigation. The High Court in its order directed the CBI to report back to the court the progress it had made in the investigation in ten days from the date of the order.

Having been had enough of the failure and lack of interest on the part of the CBI, the High Court directed suo moto the Director of the CBI to appoint a special team from New Delhi to investigate the matter. Thus P.D. Meena, the Superintendent of the CBI from New Delhi and his team undertook a month-long investigation and reported to the High Court. The CBI was satisfied that the death of Abhaya was in fact murder. However, the CBI report said that due to lack of evidence it was not possible to go further into the matter. The High Court again on 28 September 1998 directed the CBI to file its final report of the re-investigation on or before 12 October 1998.

The magistrate court later affirmed that there was clear evidence to show that some officers who took part in the investigation conducted by the local police and Crime Branch wanted to refer this case as a case of suicide.

Developments since 2007

A report by B.Sreejan, senior reporter with the Thiruvananthapuram bureau of The New Indian Express (12 April 2007), stated that the original chemical examination report of the vaginal swab and vaginal smear of Abhaya has been found to have been tampered with. The manuscript of the workbook report from the Chemical Examination Laboratory shows over-writing at four places. Using a whitener and a different ink, the word ‘‘not’’ has been added to the word ‘‘detected,’’ so as to contradict the result for testing semen detection in vagina. Varghese P Thomas, who was the first to point to murder, said the post mortem and lab reports had ruled out rape, leaving no scope for suspicions on the veracity of the report.

According to the latest news in Malayala Manorama the CBI investigation has come to a conclusion that the Sister Abhaya was murdered according to a pre plan. They arrive to a point that Abhaya witnessed some thing happening illegal, days before her murder and this prompted her executors to terminate her to spoil that evidence. The crime was committed knowing that she will come to get drinking water from the refrigerator at early morning and it was done with the help of more than two people.

As part of its investigation the CBI has conducted a Narco Analysis tests on Fr.Thomas Kottoor , Fr. Jose Poothrikkayil, Sr.Stefy and a former police officer who may have some knowledge about the death of Abhaya. This last interim report filed by the CBI team captain SP R M Krishna before the Ernakulam Chief Judicial Magistrate Court on 11 December 2007 the team was still trying to unravel the mystery behind the ‘unnatural death of Sister Abhaya’. The report, submitted in a sealed envelope to Ernakulam CJM. It didn’t speak of any progress in the re-inquiry during the past three months.

2008

On January 11, 2008, the Kerala High Court directed the CBI to produce the result of the Narco-analysis test conducted on the suspects in the case in a sealed cover before the court within two weeks. The court further directed that no third person having any right of disclosure of the content of the results till the appropriate stage, other than the High Court. In this regard, the CBI submitted it before the court on January 21, 2008. The results were submitted in a sealed cover as directed by the court. In a latest press release the CBI confirmed that Fr Thomas Kotoor is proven as the murderer through the Narco Analysis Test but waiting for more evidence for the arrest to be made.

Current status

No one has been arrested till now despite the whole local police, Crime Branch and six different CBI inquiries into the case, with no tangible results. However, the CBI is convinced and the court has accepted that she was raped and murdered. Sixteen years after a teenage nun's mysterious death made the headlines in Kerala [Images], the Central Bureau of Investigation has charged two priests and a nun with the crime. The CBI has filed a chargesheet in the Sister Abhaya case against the two priests and a nun of the St Pius X Convent in Kottayam. The Bureau alleges that one of the priests bludgeoned Sister Abhaya to death after which the trio dumped her body in the convent well on March 27, 1992.

The CBI chargesheet is based on revelations made by the accused in a narcoanalysis test conducted at the Forensic Sciences Laboratory in Bengaluru.

The chargesheet also mentions influence exerted by several top bureaucrats to hush up the case.

A CBI officer told rediff.com that an investigation into this aspect of the case would be conducted and action initiated accordingly if the bureaucrats are found to be guilty.

The chargesheet alleges that witnessing her superiors in a compromising position proved fatal for Sister Abhaya, who was 18 years old at the time of her death.

Sister Abhaya, a resident of the convent, woke up at 4 am that fateful day. According to the CBI chargesheet, she went into the kitchen to drink water before attending the morning mass.

In the kitchen, the chargesheet alleges, she saw a priest and the nun, a senior staff member at the convent, in a compromising position. The chargesheet claims she also saw a second priest standing guard outside the kitchen.

When Sister Abhaya screamed in shock on witnessing the incident, the chargesheet alleges the first priest hit her with a blunt weapon he had picked up in the kitchen. After the teenage nun collapsed, the CBI chargesheet alleges the trio dumped her body in the convent's well.

Convent staff discovered the body the next day.

The Kerala police initially declared Sister Abhaya's death a suicide. After the nun's family made representations to the state government, alleging foul play, the administration handed the case over to the CBI.

The accused were initially subjected to a narcoanalysis test in Ahmedabad. A second test was conducted at the Bengaluru laboratory after the first test was discovered to be inconclusive.

During the Bengalaru test, the trio reportedly confessed to committing the crime, following which the CBI filed the chargesheet. The Bureau has filed an interim report on the case to the chief judicial magistrate, Kottayam ref.http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/may/19sr.htm

External links

• Catholic News
• The Mangalorean
• Hindu daily news
• India News
• India News
• Hindu daily news
• News
• rediff news 1998
• The Hindu, Chief chemical examiner questioned Abhaya case: CCE questioned
• Sify, Sister Abhaya murder case takes a new turn
• The Hindu, Abhaya case: CBI told to file reports
• Deccan Herald, New turn to Sister Abhaya case