Udupi: “The murder is a pre meditated and in fact police are the prime reason behind the delay in the probe since the first day,” said advocate Shantaram Shetty and he referred the sensational Bhaskar Shetty murder case as the ‘rarest of the rare’.

Speaking to the media personnel at Buntara Sangha on Thursday, he said that this murder comes under ‘rarest of the rare’ case. It is the most barbaric crime. It is just like 1995’s Tandoor murder case.

“The least hope in this case is police had found some bones, but the forensic lab report is yet to come. The whole scenario looks like the culprits were waiting for SP Annamalai to get transferred from Udupi,” he said.

He further alleged that Manipal police were not at all ready to accept a mission complaint from Gulabi Shetty till July 28 evening, though she went there on July 27. The case was filed after the instruction which were passed by ASP Vishnuvardhan.

“Many attempts were made to close the case in the initial stage itself. First of all the FIR written by the police is just for the name sake. There is no strength in the FIR. The first destruction of evidence was made by police itself. Niranjan was taken into custody initially itself, but he was released later which gave him a chance to abscond and destruct some more evidences. Later he was once again arrested after the arrest of Rajeshwar and Navneet.”

He further said that this is not like a common criminal case. It is a tough one this case needed to be handled by some DySP or ASP ranked officer from the beginning itself. Here the police are oly not interested to provide justice to the victims, then how can the public expect justice from them in future?

“Unfortunately police have destructed many evidences till now this case has been damaged by police itself. Till today they haven’t got the basic information like account detail, phone call details and other details. Still time is there will be some clue left behind from destructing. Police have to find it. Gathering the evidences is the evidences is the first and for most job in a case like this.”

He further urged the government to depute SP Annamalai as the special investigating officer in this case. We have spoken to Minister Pramod Madhwaraj in this regard. This case can be solved, but the delay in the investigation by the police only has hindered the progress.

Bhaskar’s brother-in-law Chandrashekar Shetty, Udupi Bunts Association president Jayakar Shetty Indrali, Bhaskar Shetty’s mother Gulabi and others were present.