INA soldier's kin in better health, BJP demands probe

The health condition of INA veteran Laxmi Indira Panda's grandson Babuli Panda, who went missing for over 10 days and was found in an unconscious state here, is improving.
Revenue divisional commissioner, central division, A B Ota accompanied by Cuttack district magistrate and collector Nirmal Mishra, visited Babuli (19) at the SCB Medical College Hospital and inquired about his health.
"The health condition of Babuli is not critical. He is improving and talking like a normal person. A team of doctors is attending to the freedom fighter's grandson," Ota told reporters here.
Babuli went missing on April 16 after Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitated his parents at the Raj Bhavan here. He had accompanied them and the family was separated at Bhubaneswar railway station during their return to home to Jeypore in Koraput district.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had announced free of cost treatment for him.
DGP K B Singh told reporters that Babuli was yesterday found in unconscious state at Mancheswar. He is under treatment at the SCB Medical College Hospital now.

"He is an adult. He will tell where had had been all along," Singh said when asked about Babuli's whereabouts after his disappearance.
"We demand a probe into the disappearance of Babuli. We suspect the role of former minister and BJD spokesman Rabi Nanda and Energy Minister Pranab Prakash Das behind it. The call records of both Nanda and Das should be verified to ascertain the truth," BJP state vice-president Samir Mohanty told reporters here.

The BJD, out of a feeling of "insecurity", had played a role in the disappearance and blamed the BJP over the missing of Babuli, he alleged.
The BJD was intolerant about the felicitation of the freedom fighters' family members by the prime minister, he said.
"Since they (BJD) had not honoured the freedom fighters families during their 17-year-long rule, the BJD had attempted to give a bad name to BJP by engineering Babuli's disappearance," he said.
Ama Odisha president S R Patnaik suspected involvement of political parties in the Babuli Panda disappearance case. "With so many twists and turns, the incident is no less than high voltage drama and I suspect the involvement of political parties in the incident," he said.