Gopal Badane, cop accused of sexually assaulting Maharashtra doctor, arrested

Two suspects — including a police sub-inspector — have been arrested in connection with the death by suicide of a 29-year-old doctor from Satara, officials said on Saturday.

The doctor, who was posted at the Phaltan Sub-District Hospital, was found dead in a hotel room in Phaltan on Thursday. In a note written on her hand, she accused Prashant Bankar, a software engineer, of mental harassment, and Gopal Badane, a police sub-inspector, of sexual assault.

Bankar, who is also the son of the doctor’s landlord, was arrested from a farmhouse near Pune on Friday night, while Badane surrendered at the Phaltan Rural Police Station, said Satara SP Tushar Doshi.

According to police, the doctor and Bankar had been in a relationship that had recently turned strained. Their call and chat records reportedly revealed frequent arguments in the days before her death.

The case has sparked widespread outrage across Maharashtra, particularly after it emerged that the doctor had previously filed complaints alleging harassment by police officials and pressure from a Member of Parliament to falsify medical and autopsy records in other cases.

On Friday, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis called the incident “deeply tragic” and promised strict action.

“Whoever is responsible will face the strictest punishment. The concerned officers have already been suspended. I urge the opposition not to politicise this sensitive matter,” Fadnavis said in Mumbai.

Police sources said Bankar’s father had allegedly asked sub-inspector Badane to “intervene” after the couple’s fallout.

The case has also taken a political turn after the deceased doctor’s earlier statement to an inquiry committee claimed that aides of a Member of Parliament had asked her to “cooperate” in official matters. Opposition leaders have accused former BJP MP Ranjitsinh Naik Nimbalkar of pressuring her, though he has denied the allegations as “baseless.”