Cops want Pinki Pramanik to stand rape trial

Kolkata  :  Citing a medical report that claimed that gold medallist athlete Pinki Pramanik was a “male”, police Monday filed a chargesheet in a West Bengal court accusing the sportsperson of rape.

The police chargesheet was based on the opinion of a seven-member medical board constituted to confirm the athlete’s gender in June following allegations by her live-in partner that she was “actually a male” who had raped her repeatedly.

The formal set of charges was filed in the court of chief judicial magistrate at Barasat town in North 24 Parganas district.

Pinki is now on bail.

Additional Public Prosecutor Santomoy Bose said after the hearing: “I have seen the report…from the doctors’ opinion it can be concluded that Pinki is a male.”

The chargesheet also accused Pinki of torture, cheating, co-habiting with the promise of marriage and threat to the complainant not to disclose their relationship.

The athlete was arrested June 14 and remanded to judicial custody the next day after the athlete’s live-in partner, a divorcee and a mother of one, filed the police complaint.

Pinki was later taken to a private nursing home for a medical check-up where the test reports claimed that the athlete was indeed a male. The athlete was taken to the Barasat district hospital and finally to the state-run SSKM Hospital here for the tests.

As SSKM Hospital did not have facilities for chromosome pattern test, the samples were sent to Hyderabad where the examination was done.

Pinki later alleged that she was treated like an animal during gender tests which were done by tying her hands and feet.

The treatment meted out to the athlete had then attracted severe criticism from all quarters, including the sporting fraternity.

Pinki, who retired from athletics three years ago, won gold in the 4×400 metres relay at the 2006 Asian Games in Qatar’s capital Doha. Pinki was a silver medallist at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games the same year.