State refuses prosecution sanction against four cops in school murder case

The Haryana government declined prosecution sanctions against four police officials, including an assistant commissioner of police, chargesheeted by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the 2017 Gurugram school murder case

The Haryana government declined prosecution sanctions against four police officials, including an assistant commissioner of police, chargesheeted by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the 2017 Gurugram school murder case.

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According to the government, the sanction for prosecution was declined after examination of the CBI report, statement of relevant witnesses and relied-upon relevant documents.

On January 6, the CBI filed a supplementary chargesheet against four Gurugram police officials for falsely implicating a school bus conductor and for fabricating documents against him in the case. An investigation by the CBI had concluded that these four had allegedly fabricated false evidence with intent to procure the conviction of Ashok Kumar, a bus driver. Kumar was arrested on September 8, 2017, but was later acquitted by a special court on February 28, 2018.

Rapping the state government and the state police, the special CBI court on February 2 had stated that “they are sleeping like a Kumbhakarna” instead of discharging their statutory duties, over the delay in granting prosecution sanction for four Gurugram police personnel in the school murder case. The court directed that the requisite action be taken within 10 days.

On February 19, Rajeev Arora, the additional chief secretary to the government of Haryana, home department, passed an order in this regard concerning Birem Singh, then ACP, Narender Khatana, then station house officer of Bhondsi police station, Shamsher Singh, a sub-inspector who was the investigating officer for two days, and Subhash Chand, an ASI, the four officials named.

The state government, however, declined the prosecution sanction on the grounds that the officials made an error in the investigation, but that there was no fault in their intent.

“On examination of all the materials including FIR, investigation report of CBI, disclosure statements, statements of witnesses, recovery memos and other relevant materials, it is observed that merely oral statements have been relied upon and no medical documents have been placed on record regarding voluntarily causing hurt to Ashok Kumar to extort confession. Ashok Kumar was subjected to regular medical examination during the police custody and such medical documents are required to be relied upon and to be cited in the investigation report,” said a report filed in the court on Monday.

Sushil Tekriwal, the counsel for the complainant, said they will challenge the order in the Punjab and Haryana high court.

The state government further argued that other charges relate to inaccurate documentation, which cannot be punishable by criminal prosecution, unless there is criminal intent and proving such intent to falsely implicate any person. “There may be instances of not adopting the correct approach depending upon the circumstances of the case, but the intent of the investigation officer to conduct the investigation in the right perspective has to be seen. The intent and ultimate objective of both the agencies was to focus on investigation of the main offence of murder of seven-year-old and crack the crime,” read the government report.

The state government also took a dig at the CBI for filing a chargesheet against police officials. “The charges sought to be made against the police officials are distinct and severable from the main case entrusted to the CBI. An act or omission or lack of efficiency of failure to attain the highest standard of investigation may or not, by itself, amount to or constitute an offence.”

Deepam Raghav and Mayank Raghav, the counsels for the police officials, said the state government has refused to grant sanction for the prosecution of all four officials. The court adjourned the next hearing to March 19.