The Irony Unveiled: When Justice's Keeper Becomes the Fugitive

Agra, India — In a development that frankly, strains belief and paints a stark picture of the challenges faced by victims, an Agra lawyer, Vijay Singh Baghel, found himself on the wrong side of the law, quite literally. Arrested for allegedly assaulting a gang-rape survivor and her family right outside a police station, the story took an even more dramatic turn when he, well, broke his leg attempting a rather ill-fated escape from police custody.

It happened, or so the reports suggest, while he was being transported for a routine medical examination. Perhaps a moment of panic, a desperate gambit; Baghel reportedly leapt from the police vehicle near the Ramghat bridge. The outcome? A broken leg, a detour to SN Medical College, and eventually, a private hospital for surgery. And, just to add to his mounting woes, an additional FIR has now been lodged against him for obstructing government work and attempting to escape. One might say, an escalating series of unfortunate events, primarily of his own making.

But let's rewind a bit, shall we? What brought a man of the law to such a precipice? The genesis of this sorry affair traces back to a harrowing incident on March 27. The allegations are grave: Baghel, an advocate, is accused of threatening and assaulting a gang-rape survivor and her family within the very confines of the Sikandra police station premises. Imagine the audacity, the sheer nerve of it — to intimidate a survivor seeking justice, and worse, to allegedly prevent her from withdrawing a complaint. The police, it seems, acted swiftly after these accusations surfaced, registering a case under a slew of sections ranging from assault to dacoity and attempt to murder.

Now, this isn't just any case; there's a tangled web here. The initial gang-rape complaint, filed back in 2019, implicated three individuals. One of them, startlingly, is reportedly Baghel's own son. And Baghel himself was representing another of the accused in that very case. So, you see, the lines blur, or perhaps, they're deliberately smudged. The survivor, who has bravely protested outside the police station on previous occasions, had consistently alleged a lack of proper action, a chilling sense of apathy from the authorities, a common lament, sadly, in our pursuit of justice.

It's a deeply troubling narrative, isn't it? A lawyer, an officer of the court, tasked with upholding the very principles of law and order, now stands accused of heinous acts against a vulnerable survivor and, subsequently, for challenging the authority of the state itself. The incident underscores a pervasive and uncomfortable truth: the fight for justice, especially for survivors of gender-based violence, remains fraught with obstacles, sometimes, it seems, even from those who should be their champions.