Dec 16 gang-rape accused wants to undergo lie detector test

New Delhi, April 25 (IANS) Terming himself innocent, an accused in the Dec 16 gang rape Thursday moved an application before the fast track court seeking permission to undergo a lie detector test.

Additional Sessions Judge Yogesh Khanna asked the Delhi Police to file its reply on the plea of Vinay Sharma, one of the six accused in the case.

Saying Sharma has been falsely implicated in the case, his counsel told the court his client is innocent and has no previous criminal record.

His counsel contended that Sharma, a student of B.A. first year and was working with a gym to earn his livelihood, "has been falsely implicated in the case and he is in judicial custody since December last year without any proper reason".

He also pleaded by him that the story of prosecution is totally "false and fabricated" and made by them under government pressure due to outrage by the people in the country.

He contended that Sharma was not in the bus on the night of Dec 16, 2012 night and was instead at a music function in south Delhi along with his friend and co-accused Pawan Gupta.

Meanwhile, the court also recorded the statement of the Safdarjung Hospital doctor who was in-charge of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) where the victim was undergoing treatment for ten days.

The doctor, who had also accompanied the victim to a Singapore hospital on Dec 26 night along with four other doctors and her family members, told the court that the victim's condition was serious and the infection has also spread in her body due to injuries caused to her.

During the cross-examination by accused Gupta's counsel, the doctor said: "It is wrong to suggest that the victim was not having septicimia till Dec 21, 2012. I saw her on Dec 17 morning when she was already in septic shock due to her injuries and she was on injection dopamine infusion to maintain her blood pressure."

"There was no head of the said team of doctors. In fact, each and every member of the team was a specialist in his own respective filed," the doctor deposed, explaining that the victim was monitored by a team of doctors.

The doctor further told the court that since the victim was in critical condition, she was rushed to Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore to manage the critical condition and to let her come out of it and at a later stage, to consider her for transplant of the organs.

The 23-year-old woman was brutally tortured and gang-raped in a moving bus Dec 16, 2012 by five men and a juvenile. She later died in a Singapore hospital.

The juvenile is facing proceedings before a Juvenile Justice Board, while the other accused were put up for trial in the fast track court. One of the accused, Ram Singh, is dead, having allegedly committed suicide in jail.