For 50 years, solving bones of contention

From 1993 blasts to Neeraj Grover murder, cops have turned to forensic lab at Kalina for help

In January this year, the Pune police found a highly decomposed femur (thigh bone) of Dr Deepak Mahajan, who was brutally murdered in July 2006, from a forest near Nashik.

The police, struggling to solve the murder, did not set much store by the piece of evidence. They, all the same, decided to approach the Kalina Forensic Science Laboratory (KFSL) for help. A month later the accused in the case — a mother-daughter duo — were sentenced to death.

The KFSL has been helping the police solve such cases for half a decade now - on Monday, it completed 50 years of its existence. “It is a proud occasion for the laboratory because its work has been appreciated not only by the state and central governments but also internationally,” Dr Rukhmini Krishnamurthy, director of the laboratory, said.

It is the best equipped forensic laboratory in the country after the Ahmedabad lab, she said.

Forensic science has often come to the rescue of agencies who find themselves at the end of the tether investigating crimes. It has always been an integral part of investigations abroad, but in India its value is being acknowledged only in the past couple of years, Krishnamurthy said.

The lab is planning an awareness campaign for the police and the judiciary. “We want to sensitise the judiciary to make it understand the nuances of forensic science,” Krishnamurthy said.

“Police officers also need to be educated about the significance of a crime scene in investigation,” Krishnamurthy said. “Policemen are the first to reach a crime spot and are in the best position to pick up, collect and preserve crucial pieces of evidence for forensic investigation. Therefore it is very important to train policemen in the science.”
Krishnamurthy said cyber forensic was among the biggest challenges for the laboratory.
The Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) of the Maharashtra police had sent laptops and computers seized from American Kenneth Haywood to KFSL for testing. It was the first such case the KFSL handled.

“All over the world scientists are yet to achieve a breakthrough in cyber forensic as far as emails sent from a WiFi connection are concerned. It is a new field and it will take a while to develop a tool to crack such cases,” she said.

The KFSL has been at the forefront of research. Earlier this year, Shrikant Lade, an assistant chemical analyser at the lab, invented a new method of DNA profiling that helps scientists establish the identity of a dead body in two days as against 15 days it takes for technologies that are prevalent. Such has been the success of the technology - called the ‘Y-string’ - that the KFSL has decided to patent it.

“We will be starting the patenting procedure in a few days,” Krishnamurthy said.
d_nikhil@dnaindia.net