NEW DELHI: One of the witnesses in the rape case of a minor girl in Unnao, in which BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar was allegedly involved, has died, prompting a terse remark from Congress president Rahul Gandhi , who said it smelled of a conspiracy.

The CBI, which is probing the alleged rape case, said the safety and security of witnesses is a responsibility of the state police and it was not in the domain of the central agency.

According to the information shared by the Uttar Pradesh Police with the CBI, the witness, named Yunus, who ran a general merchant shop in Makhi village, where the MLA and the victim also live, was allegedly not well for sometime.

He was suffering from some liver ailments for quite some time and died last week, they said.

Rahul Gandhi, who is in Germany, took to Twitter and cited a news report that the witness "died under mysterious circumstances" and was "buried hurriedly without getting his post-mortem done".

"The mysterious death & hurried burial without an autopsy, of the key witness in the #Unnao rape & murder case, involving BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar, smells of a conspiracy. Is this your idea of “justice for our daughters”, Mr 56?," Gandhi wrote in comments while re-tweeting the story.

Yunus was a witness in the CBI case involving fatal assault on the father of the rape victim allegedly by the brother of the MLA Atul Singh Sengar and four others.

The father of the rape victim had died in the prison where he was kept on the alleged false charges under the arms act.

Yunus' family has given a statement to the police that he was suffering from liver ailment since 2013 and his death is the result of the disease, UP Police sources said.

They said documents related to the treatment undertaken by Yunus have also been recovered by the police.

