Ankita Bhandari murder: Allegations of ‘illegal activities’ at Uttarakhand resort under SIT scanner

Former employees of the Vanantara Resort in Pauri district of Uttarakhand, where 19-year-old Ankita Bhandari was working as a receptionist when she was murdered, have stated that several illegal activities were regularly carried out on the premises, a senior police officer said on Tuesday.

Special investigation team (SIT) chief, P Renuka Devi, told reporters that they were collecting statements of the former employees. “The SIT investigating the matter will soon prepare recorded the statements of former women staffers who worked at the resort before the murdered woman joined there as a receptionist. We have received information about former staffers who alleged illegal activities at the resort. All angles are being looked into,” she said.

Bhandari’s body was recovered from the Chilla canal in Rishikesh on September 24. Pulkit Arya, the son of an expelled BJP leader and the owner of the resort, has been arrested as the main accused in the case, along with two others.

Devi added that they will apply for police custody of the accused in “a day or two”. They are currently in 14-day judicial custody.

She further said that Bhandari’s post-mortem report, received on Monday, pegged the cause of death as drowning and indicated the presence of 4-5 antemortem injury (injuries before death) marks on her body. The report ruled out sexual assault.

The murder had sparked massive outrage and protests were reported from various parts of the state. Angry locals even set fire to the resort. Later, authorities demolished parts of the resort, saying the structures were illegally constructed.

On Tuesday, chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami sought the establishment of a fast-track court for speedy justice. In a tweet quoting Dhami, the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) said on Monday that the government has “requested the honourable court to set up a fast-track court for speedy justice in the case so that the guilty are punished as soon as possible”.

The probe into activities at the resort has led the Pauri district administration to suspend two revenue officials (called Patwaris) for negligence and to order a departmental inquiry against them.

Pauri district magistrate Vijay Kumar Jogdande said a preliminary inquiry ordered had found that the concerned revenue officials didn’t act on a complaint filed by Bhandari’s father.

One of the revenue officials rather took a complaint from the accused and ignored the victim’s father, the DM added.

One of the former employees spoke to HT about their time at the resort

Vivek Bhardwaj (24) worked as a housekeeper in the resort for a short while. His wife Rishita (20) worked as a receptionist.

Speaking to HT over the phone on Tuesday, Bharadwaj said: “The resort management would provide drugs to the guests and even girls, who would come there after the arrival of guests.”

“Once, Pulkit (main accused) asked me to give a guest a packet in his room and take ₹1,500 from him in return. We would see girls being sent to the rooms of guests. They used to ask my wife to not do their entries. After a month, we decided that we couldn’t take such things anymore. Subsequently, we returned to our home in Meerut. They repeatedly called us and insisted on returning. A week passed and we returned with the assurance that these things won’t happen now. However, it was only for some days and these illegal activities continued to go on at the resort despite our objection,” said Bhardwaj.

Meanwhile, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi cited Bhandari’s murder to hit out at the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

“It is the most disgusting, the most shameful example of how the BJP and RSS treat women in this country. The ideology of BJP and RSS views women as objects and second class citizens. India can never succeed with this ideology. A country which cannot learn to respect its women or empower them, can never achieve anything,” Gandhi said during his Bharat Jodo Yatra speech in Malappuram district of Kerala.

(WITH PTI INPUTS)