Shelter home rape probe handed over to CBI

Bihar makes last-ditch bid to keep child rape investigation under state police unit

India’s Supreme Court yesterday handed over the investigation into all 17 cases of sexual abuse of children at shelter homes in Bihar to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

The court said: “If the state government had done its job properly, the cases might not have gone to the CBI.”

A bench of Justice Madan B. Lokur, Justice S. Abdul Nazeer and Justice Deepak Gupta directed the Bihar government to provide all manpower, resources and logistical support to the CBI, even as counsel for the state made a last-ditch bid to keep the investigation under the state police.

No officer to be withdrawn

Allowing the CBI to expand its existing team of investigators already probing the Muzaffarpur shelter home horror, the court said none of the members of the investigating team would be withdrawn without the permission of the court.

Initially the investigation bureau’s counsel told the court that its earlier October 26 order directing the agency’s officiating director M. Nageswara Rao to perform only the “routine tasks” was coming in the way of taking decision on its suggestion to take over investigations in all the 17 cases of child abuse, including sexual abuse of children, at shelter homes in Bihar.

The bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi had on October 26 directed Nageswara Rao “not to take any policy decision(s) or any major decision(s) and only perform routine tasks essential to keep the CBI functional.”

Noting that the October 26 order was no impediment in CBI taking over the investigations in all the 17 cases of child abuse in Bihar shelter homes, Justice Lokur said, “This [October 26 order] does not say that all investigations will stop.”