INDIA. Jharkhand: Suspended Jharkhand BJP leader Seema Patra, arrested for torturing her domestic help, reportedly sent her son to a hospital for exposing the abuse through videos that led to the help’s rescue.
Seema Patra was arrested this morning, a day after her employee’s alleged unspeakable torture videos went viral.
Concerned about the torture, her son Ayushman reportedly shared the videos with his friend, a government employee. Vivek’s friend Anand Baskey went to the police with the videos.
Seema Patra reportedly admitted her son to the Ranchi Institute of Neuro-Psychiatry and Allied Sciences when she learned that he was trying to help Sunita.
She told the media that she sent him to the hospital because he was unwell. Asked if she admitted Ayushman to the hospital for exposing her horrific abuse of help, Patra said: “I will answer all the questions. You will have to wait.”
She insisted she was innocent. “I was accused. This is political,” she said. When pressed for answers about how the woman was injured, she said, “I am innocent.”
After rescuing the 29-year-old woman from the Patras house, the police shifted her to Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) for treatment, officials said.
The BJP suspended Seema Patra on Tuesday after a video of her domestic help accusing her of torture went viral. Her husband, Maheshwar Patra, is a retired IAS officer.
Sunita is seen in the video in a hospital bed with wounds on her body and face. She could hardly speak; she was missing many teeth and could not sit up.
She claimed that she was held captive, tortured and beaten with rods and an iron pan. She was allegedly forced to lick urine off the floor and was not given food or water for days. “She also broke my teeth with an iron rod,” said Sunita.
About Patra’s son Ayushman, whose gesture saved her, she said, “It is only because of him that I am alive.”