Think my ex circulated my MMS: Pinki Pramanik to NDTV

Pinki Pramanik, who walked out of jail today after 26 days, has suggested that it could be her live-in partner Anamika who circulated the MMS of her gender test.

The Asian Games Gold medalist, who was accused of being a man and of having raped a woman, was granted bail yesterday. The judge at the North 24 Parganas district court had observed that Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with rape could not be applied in the case. He granted bail on a surety of Rs 5000.

A sports gender expert also told NDTV that Pinki has predominant male characteristics, but can't be stripped off her medals.

Later yesterday, the court received the report of a chromosome pattern test (Karyotyping) that was done to determine Pinki's gender.

According to an Indian Express report based on Pinki's chromosomal test, the athlete has prominently male chromosomes. The judge, though, exonerated her saying that preliminary reports suggest that Pinki's incapable of rape. After the Karyotyping (a chromosomal test) was conducted at the West Bengal University of Technology, the reports were sent to the SSKM Hospital on Monday. The medical board went through it today and concluded that Pramanik has 46, XY Karyotype - present in males. At the same time the doctor also pointed out that in medical science, not everything can be said black and white. Pramanik, the doctor said, does not have all the features a normal adult male has. Read the Indian Express report here.

Pinki wore a white and black striped T-shirt, hair tied back in her regular ponytail, and looked stoic as she stepped out. Before getting into a car and driving off the 26-year-old said, "I have been framed and the woman is still trying to fix me."

Pinki told NDTV that Anamika has been blackmailing her for money. "My friend was blackmailing me for money. She had made me unconscious and taken some pictures of me, which she used against me," she said.

She also said that in the last 25 days her worst experience was at the nursing home where she was "treated like an animal".

"In the last 25 days my worst experience was at the Uma Private Nursing Home where I was first taken for the test. They tied my hands and feet and took off my clothes and took pictures. I was treated like an animal," Pinki said.

Pinki was also lodged in the men's section of the jail, a move that shocked many. She, however, said that she was not ill-treated in jail. "They did not treat me badly in jail; male and female police would escort me to the hospital."

After her arrest on June 14, Pinki was taken to a private nursing home in Barasat, West Bengal, under police custody and later to the Barasat General Hospital for gender tests, but the reports were inconclusive and the athlete was referred to the Seth Sukhlal Karnani Memorial Hospital in Kolkata.

But even this state-run facility did not have the chromosome pattern test. The test was finally conducted but the SSKM Hospital superintendent Prof Tuhin Kanti Ghosh did not disclose the medical facility.

Many sportsmen are incensed at Pinki being subjected to the embarrassment of being taken from one place to another for gender tests that have so far not thrown up anything. To top all humiliation, an MMS clip purportedly showing the athlete in the nude and which seemed to have been recorded during one of the many medical tests she was made to undergo, went viral on the Internet.

The West Bengal Human Rights Commission had stepped in, directing the home, health and police departments to inquire into the alleged "inhuman torture" on the athlete in police and jail custody.

The middle-distance runner had won a 4x400m relay gold in the 2006 Doha Asiad and a silver in the same event at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games. Pinki bagged three gold medals in the 2006 SAF Games in Colombo when she won the 400m, 800m and 4x400m relay events.

"It is sad that I have got gold to India and have been treated like this," she said.

An employee of the Eastern Railway, Pinki was suspended due to the allegations. Now out of the jail, Pinki wants her job back. "I want my job in the railways back. I want justice," she said.