Family demands CMO death case to be lodged

Lucknow: Rejecting the suicide theory of police, family members of deputy chief medical officer YS Sachan, who was found dead under mysterious circumstances, on Friday demanded that a case of murder be lodged.

"An application by doctor Sachan's wife Malti has been sent late last night to top officials including Principal Secretary (Home) and DIG Lucknow that an FIR be lodged and the case should be investigated thoroughly," the Deputy CMO's elder brother RK Sachan said.

He said those behind the "murder" should be identified and punished.

"The postmortem report clearly indicates that it's a clear cut case of murder," Sachan said while reiterating his demand for a CBI probe in the case.

He said excessive bleeding has been mentioned as the cause of death in the autopsy report which indicates murder. "Hanging cannot be caused by a belt. A doctor cannot inflict so many injuries on his own body as slitting one vein is sufficient to cause death," Sachan said.

"It is clear that first he was killed and later his body was dragged to the first floor and the incident was made too look as suicide," he said.

Sachan, however, said there was no need for a second autopsy as the postmortem report was clear. Some family members of the Deputy CMO had on Thursday demanded a second autopsy by an AIIMS doctor.

The main accused in the murder of Chief Medical Officer (Family Welfare) BP Singh, Sachan was found dead under mysterious circumstances inside the Lucknow district jail hospital on Wednesday night after which the government ordered a judicial probe into the incident.

Singh was shot dead by unidentified persons on the morning of April 2 when he had gone out for a walk.

Sachan was arrested after Singh's murder when the investigating agencies detected swindling of funds to the tune of several crore of rupees in the implementation of the National Rural Health Mission in Uttar Pradesh.

Cabinet Secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh had said on Thursday that the death of the deputy CMO was caused by "excessive bleeding" and that prima facie it was a case of suicide.

"Prima facie it's a case of suicide, but as judicial inquiry is being conducted into the incident, the facts will come out soon," he said, rejecting the demand for a CBI probe.

In the autopsy, nine injury marks were detected on the body--neck, elbows, thigh and left wrist--besides a strangulation mark on the neck.