The timing of the transfer has raised suspicions that the home's owner, Brajesh Thakur, tried to hush up the assaults on 34 inmates over a sustained period.
The Supreme Court wants the Central Bureau of Investigation to find out if Bihar's former social welfare minister was in cahoots with the owner of a Muzaffarpur shelter where inmates were sexually assailed and then moved out months before a third-party audit confirmed the horrors.
The timing of the transfer has raised suspicions that the home's owner, Brajesh Thakur, tried to hush up the assaults on 34 inmates over a sustained period.
The CBI probe could lead to the doorstep of Manju Verma, who was steering the state's social welfare department when it decided, on March 20, to shift several girls to another home. The CBI's status report submitted to the top court on Thursday said as much.
Directing the Bureau to open a line of investigation, a division bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta remarked, "The transfer seems to suggest that the Social Welfare Department of the Government of Bihar was aware of certain unsavoury activities in the shelter home and that may have been the reason for transfer of the victims."
Ex-minister Verma is already under scanner for her proximity to Brajesh Thakur. The CBI has claimed that the minister's spouse, Chandrashekhar Verma, spoke to Thakur 17 times between January and May. It was in May that Mumbai's Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) submitted its audit report to the state government after interviewing the shelter's girls.
The court has directed the state to file an affidavit detailing the "circumstances necessitating the transfer of the girls" before the report's submission.
The judges also instructed the Bihar police to examine an arms case under way against the Vermas with "seriousness". The CBI's report has recorded that the state police seized live cartridges of prohibited bore from the Verma residence.
The agency, meanwhile, was further tasked with intimating the nearest income-tax commissioner to launch an investigation into the assets owned by Thakur and his NGO. The CBI says it has evidence to prove that Thakur used his influence to obtain funds worth Rs 4.5 crore from state government over the last decade in the name of his shelter, Sewa Sankalp Evam Vikas Samiti. During this period, he purchased 35 vehicles.
The agency, which is slated to submit its next status report on October 25, will also have to establish if Thakur has a chequered record. The sleuths will unearth his connections and see if other crimes took place at the shelter.
They have stated in their report that neighbours would hear the girls at the shelter scream but fear of Brajesh Thakur kept them from reporting the matter to the police.
Meanwhile, the victimised girls will continue to receive psycho-social counselling by Bengaluru's National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (Nimhans) till the first week of October. The CBI is banking on their revelations to crystallise its case.
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