Court Order Substantiates Odisha Govt’s Attempts To Declared Gopal Das Mentally Ill: Jayanarayan Mishra

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has all along been trying to project Gopal Das, the lone accused in the health minister Naba Kishore Das murder case, as mentally ill, Leader of Opposition (LoP) Jayanarayan Mishra said on Monday while reacting to medical board’s observations on him. 

“The court order, in which excerpts from the psychiatric examination report have been mentioned, has substantiated it,” he said.

The medical board, which was constituted by the Directorate of Medical Education and Training (DMET), Odisha, found no abnormality in Gopal during his psychiatric examination.

“There is a big conspiracy behind the murder. The Crime Branch is incapable of investigating it. The Odisha Police cannot touch the people whom we want to be brought under the purview of investigation. The probe should, therefore, be handed over to the CBI,” Jayanarayan further said.

While claiming that Gopal had a prolonged history of mental illness, the Crime Branch had stated that the medical board opined that “there is a need to have detailed examination of the accused to come to a definite conclusion about his mental health”.

Jharsuguda Additional Sessions Judge court on March 3 rejected its revision petition for further mental evaluation of the accused at NIMHANS, Bengaluru, and also noted that the medical board did not mention any mental illness.

The plea was, however, rejected on technical ground since it had already exhausted its option of taking the accused on two weeks custody.

Besides the forensic psychological assessment of the accused, the Crime Branch has already conducted the Layered Voice Analysis (LVA) test with the help of experts from CFSL, New Delhi. He was also taken to Gandhinagar in Gujarat for polygraph and narco analysis tests.