Agreed to narco test under duress, says Bengal actor’s maid
KOLKATA: Kolkata police has waded into a row by allegedly coercing a 54-year-old domestic help into agreeing to a lie-detector test over a theft reported at Bengali actress Rituparna Sengupta’s house in April.
The help, Aloka Naskar, said the police took advantage of her being uneducated. She has filed a petition to withdraw her consent for the narco-analysis test.
“The police misled me. I am illiterate… I was kept in complete dark about the harmful effects of the test. However, my relatives brought these into notice and I decided to withdraw my consent,” said Naskar.
The actor reported a theft of jewellery worth ~9 lakh from her mother’s south Kolkata home in April but told media that she didn’t suspect any of her helps. Sengupta couldn’t be reached comments.
A person subjected to the narco test is injected with sodium amytal or sodium pentothal that neutralise the power to imagine, necessary for lying. The person becomes semi-conscious. A narco analysis may help the police is getting clues but statements made during the test are not admissible in court.
Police denied the charges and said the magistrate explained the test to Naskar and that the results might go against her. “But even after that she agreed to the test. We have all the necessary documents with us,” said deputy commissioner Praveen Kumar Tripathi.
The allegations have led to activists accusing the police of overstepping its limits.
“In my two decades of work in human rights, I have never come across narco test for petty theft. The SC turned down a request for narco test on CPI(Maoist) politburo member Kobad Ghandy since he declined permission,” said Ranjit Sur, vice-president of APDR.