How Rahul Gandhi Put the Jitendra Narain Case Back in Focus in Andaman

Sri Vijaya Puram, May 01: Rahul Gandhi’s remarks during his recent visit to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands have brought renewed attention to the criminal case against former chief secretary Jitendra Narain, reviving public debate over abuse of power, women’s safety and the slow-moving legal process in one of the islands’ most closely watched cases.

Speaking in Sri Vijaya Puram, the Congress leader referred to the case while questioning the gap between official messaging on women’s safety and the realities on the ground when allegations involve powerful individuals. His intervention has put the spotlight back on a prosecution that, though no longer in daily headlines, continues to carry significant political and institutional weight in the islands.

The case dates back to September 2022, when a 21-year-old woman alleged that she had been lured with the promise of a government job and sexually assaulted at the official residence of the then chief secretary. A Special Investigation Team was formed after the Chief Judicial Magistrate in Port Blair directed the registration of an FIR on September 30, 2022. The Union Home Ministry later suspended Narain in October 2022 on grounds of “grave misconduct.”

The SIT filed its chargesheet in February 2023. Reports at the time said the probe relied on witness testimony, digital evidence and forensic material, and that investigators had examined around 90 witnesses. News reports also said the prosecution alleged a wider pattern of exploitation linked to job promises.

Case still pending

Narain was granted conditional bail by the Port Blair circuit bench of the Calcutta High Court on February 20, 2023. The conditions included that he could not visit the Andaman and Nicobar Islands except for the trial, had to surrender his passport and could not influence witnesses. The Supreme Court later declined to interfere with that bail order in August 2023, and a review petition against it was dismissed in August 2024.

The legal case, however, remains alive. In June 2024, the Calcutta High Court’s Port Blair circuit bench rejected Narain’s plea to quash the proceedings and seek discharge. The court held that, at that stage, it could not conclude that the FIR, chargesheet and accompanying material disclosed no offence, and directed that charges be framed expeditiously and the trial proceed.

That continuing pendency is what gives Gandhi’s remarks political force. In the islands, the Narain case was never seen as just another criminal matter. It was one of the rare moments when allegations of sexual assault, official power and recruitment-linked coercion collided at the highest level of the local administration. The fact that the accused was the serving chief secretary when the allegations surfaced gave the case unusual gravity from the outset. Narain has denied the allegations and claimed he was being framed.

There is also renewed interest in Narain’s present status in government service. The latest official-style listing available in the IAS Civil List shows his status as “Under Suspension”, and no later official order could be independently verified showing that the suspension had been revoked or that he had been given a fresh posting. Before his suspension, he had been serving as Chairman and Managing Director of the Delhi Financial Corporation.

That detail matters because the case has increasingly come to symbolise a wider public concern: whether powerful officials are held to the same standards of scrutiny and consequence as everyone else. Bail, of course, does not amount to acquittal, and the matter remains before the courts. But in high-profile cases involving senior bureaucrats, delay itself becomes politically charged. Every procedural turn, every appeal and every adjournment feeds the larger public perception that accountability is slower and harder when power is involved.

Rahul Gandhi’s remarks have now returned the case to the centre of public discussion in the islands. Whether that changes the legal trajectory is another matter. But politically, the intervention has succeeded in doing one thing: reminding the islands that one of their most consequential recent cases of alleged abuse of office is still unresolved, still sensitive and still a test of how institutions respond when power and criminal allegations intersect.