Bitti Mohanty's father breaks silence, will co-operate with cops

Rape convict Bitti Mohanty’s father, former Odisha DGP BB Mohanty, on Thursday broke his silence over his son’s arrest, and said that he would co-operate with the police in the case. “I will co-operate with the Kerala police. Since the matter is sub-judice I will not comment on the case. If Italian marines have refused to speak to the media, why should I? Media is sensationalising the case,” IBN-Live quoted the ex-top cop as saying. [caption id=“attachment_661127” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Bitti Mohanty. PTI[/caption] Bitti, convicted for raping a German tourist in Alwar in 2006, managed to jump parole and evade arrest for six years with a lot of meticulous planning. An anonymous handwritten letter to the bank where he worked in Kerala, giving details about his real identity, resulted in his arrest on 8 March. IBN-Live reported that the Kerala police is expected to interrogate former Odisha top cop BB Mohanty on Friday and will also visit Bitti’s school and college in an effort to conclusively establish his identity. Ever since it was reported that his fugitive son Bitti was arrested, Mohanty had switched off his cell phone and was not meeting anybody, particularly media people. However, Bitti’s aunt, Kamini Patnaik had defended her nephew and said “Bitti is innocent.” “Had the case involved any Indian woman, I would have believed because of Bitti’s age. But, I do not believe this case as they (Germans) have an open society,” Kamini had said. After jumping parole in 2006, Bitti obtained an MBA degree and managed to get employment in the State Bank of Travancore as a probationary officer. He took on a fictitious identity, Raghav Rajan, and during his stay also learnt to speak Malayalam well. According to police sources, though Bitti had admitted his true identity during interrogation, he retracted the admission when produced before a Magistrate on Saturday, and claimed he was not the absconding rapist. With inputs from agencies