A team from the Phaltan police arrested Prashant Bankar, one of the two men the doctor had named in a suicide note written on her palm, from Pune, around 125km from Satara, in the morning, he said.
Bankar, accused of mentally harassing the victim and now facing abetment of suicide charge, was later produced before a Satara district court which sent him to police custody for four days, according to the official.
The doctor, hailing from Beed district in the Marathwada region of central Maharashtra and posted at a government hospital in Satara district, was found hanging in a hotel room in Phaltan town on Thursday night.
In the suicide note written on her palm, she alleged that police sub-inspector (PSI) Gopal Badane raped her on multiple occasions, while Bankar, a a software engineer, mentally harassed her.
A case of rape and abetment of suicide was registered against the duo in Phaltan in Satara district. According to the police, Bankar is the son of the landlord of the house where the doctor resided. She had allegedly called him over the phone and chatted with him before ending her life, they said.
Sub-inspector Badane, who is yet to be arrested, was suspended from service after his name came up during the probe, police said.
The doctor, meanwhile, was cremated at her native place in Beed’s Wadwani tehsil on Friday night.
Her relatives demand capital punishment for the accused in the case.
She complained multiple times about harassment, but her grievances were not addressed, a relative alleged while talking to a news channel.
Another relative relative claimed the victim was pressured to change medical reports at the sub-district hospital where she worked.
“Political people in Phaltan often asked her to change medical reports as she used to be regularly on autopsy duty. She had complained multiple times against the PSI (named in the note), but her complaints were not looked into,” the relative stated.
“Just apprehending the accused is not enough. They should be hanged to ensure justice to the doctor and her family,” emphasised the relative.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Ambadas Danve hit out at Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who also holds the home portfolio, over the doctor’s suicide and the name of a police officer cropping up in the case.
“There is a need for women’s security more than that of ‘Ladki Bahin’ (a financial scheme for women from low income families). If people who flourished under the wings of Fadnavis are harassing women in such a manner, then Fadnavis has failed as the Home Minister and should resign,” Danve wrote on X.
Danve appealed to National Commission for Women chairperson Vijaya Rahatkar to intervene in the case.
BJP MLA Suresh Dhas demanded that an MP who allegedly tried to pressurise the woman doctor be made an accused in the case.
“Investigation will reveal who are the MP and his aides involved in threatening her. If they are involved, no matter who they are, they should be made accused in the case,” said the MLA from Ashti in Beed district.
As per a purported reply submitted by the woman doctor earlier this year to authorities in Satara district after a subordinate police official complained about her, she faced threats from police officials over her way of working, and also taunts over crime in Beed, her native district.
One of her relatives claimed she often faced pressure from police to change post-mortem reports and also to modify medical test reports of arrested persons brought to the government hospital.
Dhas also demanded an independent inquiry into her death, and action against those who did not take cognizance of her complaints in the past.
Majalgaon MLA and NCP leader Prakash Solanke met the doctor’s family members who demanded setting up of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the case.
She was mentally strong and would not have committed suicide unless she had faced severe harassment, they said.
The woman’s two cousins, also doctors, alleged that the hospital administration assigned her post-mortem duties only to harass her.
According to the woman’s family, she wanted to do an MD (Doctor of Medicine) course, and was preparing for it.
The loan of Rs 3 lakh taken for her MBBS course was yet to be repaid, her uncle told PTI.
“Her father is a farmer, he is not an educated person. I am a teacher and I took her to Beed for schooling….she did not want to stop at MBBS, but wanted to pursue MD in medicine, ENT or non-clinical branches,” he said.
