The medical confir mation that an 11-year-old girl was raped on Caranza lem beach on Saturday has exposed a glaring staffing failure at the Panjim Police Station, where the trauma tised child faced a delay in even getting her complaint registered because there was not a single female police officer available to handle the case. The assault took place be tween 10.30 am and 11 am on Saturday, with the med ical examination later con firming rape. While Panjim Police, led by PI Vijaykumar Chodankar, moved swiftly to track down and arrest the accused, the absence of a woman officer at the capital’s police sta tion complicated the process of recording the minor’s statement and registering the FIR. Panjim Police told O Heraldo that it received an alert from the Police Control Room (PCR) at around 1.30 pm.
Personnel immediately rushed to the spot, scanned lo cal CCTV footage and arrested 22-year-old Jeevan Oli alias Ravi, a Nepal native and a vagabond who has been residing in Caranzalem for three years. “The victim, who was brought to the police station, was complaining of excruciating pain in her abdominal area. She also mentioned that she was hungry, so we provided her with lunch before taking her to the hospital for an ex amination,” a police official stated on the condition of ano nymity. A senior official said the police team immediately visited the crime scene and worked to identify the suspect, whose identity was initially unknown, to prevent him from fleeing the area. But after the accused was apprehended, the police sta tion’s own staffing deficit emerged as a major hurdle. “The victim is just an 11-year-old child, and it would have been wrong for us to question her since all the officers present at the Panjim Police Station were male. It is against both legal ethics and the law for male police personnel to interrogate rape victims,” the official explained. With no woman officer on duty, the police had to seek assistance from another station. “Due to the lack of an on-duty female officer, we had to request our counterparts in Agassaim to depute a woman police officer to take over the case. Since she was already handling another matter at the Goa Medical College and Hospital in Bambolim, it took a considerable amount of time for her to arrive at the Panjim Police Station,” the of ficial added. The situation was the result of an administrative vacuum that has left the capital’s police station without a single fe male officer despite its responsibility for handling crimes against women and children. Two female police officers permanently posted at Panjim are currently on child care leave, while two others recently transferred there from the Women’s Police Station and the PCR have yet to formally take charge. “We have requested the department to expedite the pending transfer orders so these officers can report for duty. Until that happens, our hands are tied,” the senior of ficial lamented.
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The ordeal did not end with the delay at the police sta tion. Although the child was taken by police to the Goa Medical College and Hospital in Bambolim for examination, her grandmother remained at the station to complete the paperwork. On reaching GMC, however, doctors insisted that a legal guardian be physically present to accompany the minor during the medical examination, forcing the family to deal with yet another procedural hurdle while the child was al ready undergoing the trauma of a sexual assault. The swift arrest of the accused may have prevented his escape, but the episode has laid bare a disturbing fact – the police station in the State capital was not adequately staffed to ensure that the child could move through the complaint and medical process without avoidable delays.
Condemning the incident, Bailancho Ekvott president Auda Viegas said, “Where is the safety for children and women? Society has to rise against such incidents and stop them. This is a serious matter and should be dealt with the seriousness it deserves. The delay at the police station only magnified the trauma faced by the victim. The police high er-ups should empower police stations to take quick action in such cases. There should be no reason for delay in deal ing with such incidents.
