Soumya’s autopsy: High-level probe committee constituted

October 12, 2011: The state government has on Wednesday constituted a high-level committee to conduct a probe into the recent controversy over postmortem report of Soumya, a 23 year old woman who was killed after being pushed out of a moving train in Thrissur.

Making the already complicated Soumya murder case even more intricate, the first witness produced by the defence counsel Dr Unmesh, testified that he did the post-mortem on the body of Soumya but the post-mortem certificate, which was released for investigation, was another one by Dr Sherly Vasu saying she did the postmortem.

Health Minister Adoor Prakash today informed that the high-level committee consisting of Forensic department officials will submit the report within three days.

Unmesh, an associate professor of the Department of Forensic Medicine, Thrissur Medical Collge and police surgeon at Thrissur, said that he did the postmortem on Soumya on 7 February as per the direction from Dr Sherly Vasu, head of the Forensic Medicine Department.

He received the body from police and signed the receipt. He carried out the postmortem with the assistance of Dr Rajendra Prasad.

He had also prepared four copies of postmortem certificates and other mandatory documents. He signed the passport, which was given to the police while handing over the body after postmortem examination.

Unmesh said that postmortem certificate by him was missing and there were several corrections and additional documents in the one given by DrSherly Vasu, who did not do the postmortem. Unmesh said he found glaring contradictions in Sherly Vasu’s postmortem certificates, grossly different from those of the original.