Bhubaneswar: The court of Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) at Chandbali in Bhadrak Sunday sent prime accused Sarmistha Rout and her close aide Jhuna Bhoi on three more days of police remand for interrogation in connection with the murder of lensman Manas Swain, an official said.
On completion of the five-day remand period, the Crime Branch (CB) Sunday produced ex-OIS officer Niranjan Sethi, Ranjan Nayak, Sarmsitha and Jhuna before the court and sought permission to take all the accused on remand for another five days.
The court, however, granted three more days of remand for Sarmistha and Jhuna while rejecting the same for Niranjan and Ranjan.
On the other hand, the CB is yet to unravel the reason behind the murder and the mystery surrounding the contents of the missing memory card.
During the five-day remand, the investing agency has only managed to unravel information about the way the accused executed their plan to murder the cameraman and evaded arrest for a long.
The CB is hopeful of eliciting detailed information regarding the memory card during the fresh rounds of interrogation of Sarmistha and Jhuna, sources said.
Meanwhile, the CB officials were examining a diary of Niranjan that was reportedly seized from the office of Sarmistha’s web portal here Saturday.
Sources said the accused had unsuccessfully tried to paint the murder as a suicide.
The murder of Swain, who had worked at Sarmistha’s web portal, sent ripples across the state as he was allegedly killed for possessing a memory chip, containing controversial and objectionable videos and photos of some high-profile persons, which could have landed Sarmistha in trouble.
Swain was allegedly kidnapped from Bhadrak February 7. He had gone there to film a wedding function.
When he did not return days after the event and could not be traced, his family members lodged a complaint with Chandbali police February 14.
Subsequently, the police arrested three persons for kidnapping Swain. During interrogation, the police came to know that the trio had killed Swain in Bhubaneswar and buried his body in Nayagarh.
PNN
