Bhubaneswar: The body of an Odisha woman cricketer Rajasree Swain, who has been missing since January 11, was found hanging inside the Brahmanbasta forest in Atagarh of Cuttack district, police said on Friday. However, the entire incident still remains shrouded in mystery as the police are yet to confirm the reasons behind her “sudden disappearance” from a training camp at Bajrakabati here.
According to earlier reports, Rajasree had gone missing since January 11 after failing to qualify to play for the Odisha team in a national-level tournament scheduled to be held in Puducherry.
Soon after the woman cricketer went missing mysteriously, the Odisha Cricket Association (OCA) lodged a missing person complaint with the Mangalabag police. Though the police failed to trace her whereabouts, they found her scooter and helmet in an abandoned state in a forest in the Athagarh area and seized the items. Rajasree’s mobile phone was also switched off since the day she went missing and this gave rise to suspicions of foul play.
Rajasree Swain, a right-hand pacer and batter, was a member of the 25-member team that participated in a cricket training camp organised at Bajrakabati here. The team was training to participate in an upcoming national-level cricket tournament scheduled to be held in Puducherry. All the women crickets of the camp were lodged in a hotel in Bajrakabati.
The team was selected on January 10 but Rajasree didn’t find a place on the final list. It is said that Rajashree was under stress for not being selected for the final team. On January 11, all the women cricketers went to Tangi for practice but Rajashree told her coach that she would be going to Puri to meet her father.
When Rajashree did not return within the stipulated time, her coach filed a missing person’s complaint with the Mangalabag police. The police launched an investigation into the matter but failed to trace the cricketer’s whereabouts till this morning.
On Thursday morning, a forest department staff Khirode Mallick first detected Rajasree’s body while he was on a round of the forest area. He informed the matter to his superior who informed the police about the discovery. A team from the Mangalabag police and Forest department personnel launched a search operation in the evening but they did not make any headway as there was little sunlight.
The team resumed its search on Friday morning and found the woman cricketer’s body hanging from a tree in the Brahmanbasta forest. The body was sent for post-morten and an unnatural death case (UD) case registered in the connection. While waiting for the post-mortem report, police launched an investigation into the case.
Meanwhile, Rajashree’s parents met the Odisha Sports minister in Bhubaneswar earlier on Friday morning and urged him to trace the whereabouts of their daughter.
