40 days later… Parents of 21-year-old Shreshta, who died in a road accident, demand justice | Raipur News

Raipur: Forty days after a 21-year-old girl was killed in a hit-and-run accident in state capital Raipur on August 1, the distraught parents demanded justice on the girl's birthday and demanded a CID probe into the case.
“If she were alive today, who was 601st in NEET-UG, she would have already started her medical studies. Not to mention the grief we go through every day; we are not getting justice as the accused has been released on bail. Though she committed hit and run, no stringent provisions were filed in the FIR. The same woman was booked for 'dangerous driving' just ten days before the incident,” the parents alleged.
Speaking to TOI, Aabhas Satpathy, father of deceased Shreshtha, said that the police had not given them the autopsy report of their daughter and that the report was given to them only when he spoke about it to the media on Tuesday.
On the morning of August 1, Shreshtha was on her way to collect medicines for her ailing father when she was hit by an SUV driven by accused Shikha Agrawal. Shreshtha sustained severe head and chest injuries and was rushed to the hospital by an eyewitness, but was declared dead.
“The accused had fled from the accident spot and though Telibandha police station is just 100 metres from the accident spot, she had left the vehicle at another police station. This is a case of hit and run. The CCTV footage of the accident spot could not be recovered as there is no backup of the footage and I doubt that the CCTV footage was not scanned properly,” Satpathy said.
Speaking to TOI, Raipur SSP Santosh Singh said an FIR was filed the next day and the vehicle was handed over within half an hour of the accident.
“It does not matter at which police station the accused surrenders. Also, there is no separate section for hit and run that can be imposed. The accused was arrested the next day under the 'culpable homicide' section and was released on bail as per the rules. The police are investigating all the points and will file charges soon,” Singh said.
If a person is hit by a car and the driver stops to investigate, their life is in danger because of the angry mob, police said.
The parents, however, are not convinced by the police's version of events and are demanding precise information about the speed of the car that hit their daughter on the access road. They claim that just ten days before the fatal accident, the same car was fined Rs 2,000 for driving on the wrong side of the road.
In a letter to the Inspector General of Police, Raipur, the parents wrote, “The accused is the wife of a state cadre official (currently OSD of a minister) and it is suspected that her political influence has influenced the investigation. If she really handed over the car within half an hour or after 7-8 hours, a thorough investigation is expected. We have lost our precious child, who was also taking care of his parents. And one cannot just brush off a crime committed like this.”
The parents have requested updated information on the investigations conducted within the last 40 days of the incident.