A cold-blooded murderer may escape the punishment due to weak autopsy report. It has been noticed in many cases that murders turn into unusual or accidental deaths as country’s government medical college hospitals do not have minimum forensic experts.
It is perturbing to note that government medical colleges are facing serious difficulties to perform autopsy of dead bodies properly. It may be mentioned that Noor Islam, a residence of Belkuchi upazila of Sirajganj district was strangulated in June 2018 and his body was hanged by the criminals to make it look like a suicide. The autopsy report and the Belkuchi police had termed the incident as a suicidal case, saying Noor Islam was not murdered.
Forensic training of doctors
who conduct autopsies is a must
But, three years later Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI) in its investigation found Noor Islam did not commit suicide rather he was murdered in a pre-planned way. Like Noor Islam, many people were allegedly murdered and they were shown that they took their own lives due to weak autopsy report. Thus criminals get the opportunity to escape murder charges.
In this regard, PBI Chief and Deputy Inspector General Banaj Kumar Majumder rightly said that an accurate autopsy report is very important to open an investigation into an unnatural death until the final hearing. But, most of the physicians, who conduct autopsy of dead body, do not have basic training on it. Besides, country’s government hospitals also do not have modern infrastructures and scientific equipments facilities and systems that help preparing a correct autopsy report. Hence, many autopsy reports are done wrongly. Therefore, in many cases, the murder incidents turn into suicidal or accidental death.
There are just about 40 forensic experts in the country’s 33 government medical college hospitals. But the state-run hospitals need minimum 170 forensic experts to prepare accurate autopsy report. It is worth noting that there is no forensic expert in the country’s district general hospitals; medical officers conduct the autopsy on dead body. Besides, many hospitals also do not have morgue to preserve the dead bodies. There is no separate cell at the hospitals’ morgue to preserve the sample. Even some hospitals do not have refrigerators.
Proper autopsy of a dead body can detect the cause behind the death of person. Therefore, the government must appoint the foreign experts at its all hospitals immediately to determine the cause of death based on autopsy reports. Last but not least, forensic training of doctors who conduct autopsies is a must.