K’taka govt forms SIT in Dharmasthala case

HOW THE CASE UNFOLDED

- Arun Dev

The state government has constituted a special investigation team (SIT) to probe allegations of mass burials, sexual assault, and disappearances of women in Dharmasthala area of Daksihina Kanna district over the last two decades, officials said on Sunday.

The government, in an order dated July 19, said it was forming the SIT following a recommendation from the Karnataka state commission for women. The commission's appeal was based on a media report, dated July 12, which detailed a family’s complaint about their missing daughter and the court testimony of a sanitation worker who claimed to have buried multiple bodies in the temple town.

According to the Commission, the report and sworn statement “indicate that for over 20 years, serious acts of assault, murder, rape, unnatural deaths, and disappearances have occurred involving many women and female students”.