Delhi Police rejects allegations of Rajbala's family

Rebutting allegations of Rajbala's family, Delhi Police tonight claimed she had suffered injuries during a stampede in Ramlila Maidan during police action against yoga guru Ramdev and the cause of death was not a lathi-charge.

Police also suggested that 51-year-old Rajbala, who died in a city hospital after battling for life for nearly four months, was suffering from "gross" osteoporosis -- thinning of bone tissue and loss of bone density over time -- and this could have led to her suffering serious injuries.

Rajbala, a resident of Haryana's Gurgaon, had sustained serious spinal injuries during the police action in Ramlila Maidan on June 5 and was admitted with cervical spinal injuries. She underwent a surgery and remained on ventilator since her admission in hospital and had become a quadriplegic.

"Rajbala was injured in a stampede and not in a police lathicharge. She has not told doctors at the hospital about any police lathicharge and instead had told them that she got injured in a stampede," Dharmendra Kumar, Special Commissioner (Law and Order), told reporters.

The medico-legal certificate (MLC) filed by doctors on the basis of the victim's statement also did not mention police lathi-charge but stampede, he said.

"The MLC will have the nature of injuries and what the victim tells a doctor. It was not recorded in the MLC that the injuries were caused by a lathicharge," he said.

Kumar said the medical report they received from the hospital also noted that she was suffering from "gross" osteoporosis. "In this condition, bones become brittle. Even a small injury could become serious in this case," he said.

Earlier in the day, her daughter-in-law Rajesh Malik and other relatives  alleged that she died due to injuries suffered during lathi-charge and debunked the police theory.