Jammu temple row: Police unaware whether youth involved is of ‘unsound mind’

Sources said that the medical examination of Yasir, which was scheduled to be held by a Board of Doctors at the government run psychiatry hospital on Saturday, got deferred partially due to change of a member in the Board of Doctors and partially due to the failure of police in bringing the accused to the hospital.

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“The police officials visiting the hospital in the afternoon said that they will soon convey a date and place for examination of the accused as bringing him to the hospital may lead to law and order problem, besides posing threat to his life,’’ a senior doctor at the hospital said.

Following state government’s decision to get medical examination of Yasir so as to ascertain whether he was of unsound mind or not, Principal of the Government Medical College Dr. Zahid H. Gillani had constituted a Board of Doctors for the purpose. Its members included Dr. Anil Mahajan, Head of Department (Medicines), Dr. B N Bhougal (Medicines), Dr. Shabnam Rivees (Psychologist), Dr. B R Kundal (Neurologist) and Dr. Rakesh Banal (Psychiatrist).

The Board of Doctors were asked to examine Yasir at Psychiatric Hospital and submit their report to the Principal so that he can forward the same to the government,

This had come a day after state government announced in the Legislative Assembly that it was withdrawing PSA slapped on Yasir as a lunatic cannot be detained under such provisions of law.

On Saturday morning, as doctors assembled at the hospital, Dr. Banal referred to the presence of only one psychiatrist in the Board, saying that it should have one more psychiatrist so as to have second expert opinion also while preparing a report on the status of mental health of Yasir.

According to sources, Dr. Banal took the matter to the principal who immediately replaced Dr. Anil Mahajan by Dr. Maheshwar Singh, a medical officer working in the psychiatry hospital.

Some senior police officers visited the hospital in the morning, but they did not bring the accused there on the ground that there was a controversy over the constitution of the medical board.

However, when it got reconstituted by the principal, the police did not bring Yasir for medical examinations even after all the Board members kept waiting at the hospital till afternoon, one of the doctors said.

Apart from Yasir, a suspended police constable Gurbachan Singh alias Minta, who too was apprehended for committing a similar incident of sacrilege at a temple in Nanak Nagar last week, has also been detained under PSA.

Violence broke out in Jammu city with protestors pelting stones on police station and torching vehicles in Janipura area protesting the act of sacrilege at Aap Shambu temple in Roopnagar. Twenty two people were apprehended by police who were later released unconditionally following threat from VHP leader Leela Karn Sharma advocate about the repeat of 2008 Amarnath type agitation which had pushed the state to religious and regional polarisation.

“The grounds enumerated in the application seeking police remand are well founded,’’ the magistrate had observed while remanding him to police custody up to June 22.

Yasir, according to his family members, is of unsound mind and he has been undergoing treatment since 2008. As he had become violent a fortnight ago, his younger brother Tanveer brought him to a private clinic in Roopnagar.
Dr Jagdeesh Thapa of the clinic denied having examined Yasir on Tuesday, saying that he came to his clinic at 5.30 pm while he had committed the sacrilege act an hour earlier. “However, if I had earlier treated him, the family must be having my prescriptions etc.’’ he pointed out.

The doctor’s clinic is nearby the temple where Yasir first broke the flower decorations at the entrance and then kicked the Shiva idol. The CCTV footage of his act went viral on social networking sites leading to violence and arson making administration suspended mobile internet services for days together across the state to check trouble from spreading.