Court orders probe into missing eyeball of dead convict

The Delhi High Court Thursday directed a judicial magistrate to hold an inquiry into the missing eyeball of a dead prisoner from the mortuary of a government hospital.

A division bench of Justice Kailash Gambhir and Justice Indermeet Kaur gave three weeks for the probe on the missing body part of Rajkumar, who was admitted to the government-run Rajan Babu Institute of Pulmonary Medicine and Tuberculosis (RBIPMT) for TB treatment on Nov 27 but died Dec 9.

Rajkumar was undergoing a life term for killing his wife

As per the plea, Rajkumar's body was kept in the hospital's mortuary and when it was shifted to another hospital (Babu Jagjivan Ram) for post-mortem as RBIPMT does not have the necessary facilities, it was found that his right eyeball and soft tissue of lower half of ear lobe were missing.

"Since the said aspect of missing of right eyeball of the victim and missing of soft tissue of the lower half of pinna of the victim is shocking incident and it is required to be given primacy," the bench said.

Directing the magistrate to visit the mortuary of RBIPMT, the bench said: "We accordingly direct the magistrate (judicial) to complete the inquiry on this aspect at the first instance and submit its report within a period of three weeks."

It further directed the concerned area SHO to accompany the magistrate during the visit.

The court's order came on the bail plea of the convict, which he had filed earlier on medical ground but while the matter was pending, the court was informed of the convict's death.

Rajkumar's lawyer informed the court about the whole incident and the court had earlier directed the additional public prosecutor to file a status report.

In the report, the prosecutor had told the court that the magistrate is yet to complete the inquest report and the judge is also conducting a separate inquiry into the missing organ of the victim.