E-Paper
35 years on, 12 retired policemen booked in Kanpur’s ‘fake encounter’ case
The FIR was registered at Maharajpur police station on Saturday (October 17) on a complaint by CB-CID inspector Sushil Kumar. The CB-CID inquiry had named 18 policemen, including the then station house officer, Vidyasagar Tripathi, and investigating officer Ramesh Chandra Bhatole. Six of them have since died, leaving 12 to face action.
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An alleged fake police encounter has taken 35 years to reach the stage of an FIR against the policemen accused of staging it. Twelve retired policemen have been booked in Kanpur after the Crime Branch-Criminal Investigation Department (CB-CID) found that an encounter claimed by the police in 1991 was fabricated and evidence against 12 arrested men was false.
The FIR was registered at Maharajpur police station on Saturday (October 17) on a complaint by CB-CID inspector Sushil Kumar. The CB-CID inquiry had named 18 policemen, including the then station house officer, Vidyasagar Tripathi, and investigating officer Ramesh Chandra Bhatole. Six of them have since died, leaving 12 to face action.
DCP (East) Satyajit Gupta confirmed the FIR had been registered against the policemen at Maharajpur police station and said the CB-CID would continue to investigate the case.
However, officials did not specify what took them so many years to register the FIR.
The case dates back to the night of August 22-23, 1991, when the Maharajpur police claimed to have foiled a robbery attempt near Narval crossing on GT Road. According to the police version, a gang had blocked the road with tree branches to stop vehicles and rob their occupants. Rakesh Pathak and 11 others were arrested, and the police claimed to have recovered illegal firearms, ammunition and bombs.
A subsequent CB-CID investigation found the encounter to be fabricated. It concluded that the police had falsely implicated the 12 men, passed off licensed firearms as illegal weapons recovered in the case, and submitted false charge sheets in court.
The inquiry followed a complaint by Devi Prasad Pathak, Rakesh’s elder brother, to the Uttar Pradesh government. He alleged that the police had falsely implicated his brother and others after the family refused to give a plot of land to the then station house officer free of cost. The government ordered a CB-CID inquiry in 1991. The investigation was conducted by the then inspector RP Singh, and the final report was approved by the CB-CID headquarters in Lucknow on September 25, 1995.
The truck driver, Umashankar Pasi, and cleaner, Brijendra Singh, contradicted the police account. They told investigators that they were transporting soap from Kanpur to Varanasi when a policeman boarded their vehicle near Ramadevi crossing on the evening of August 22, followed by six other men. The truck was then taken to Maharajpur police station.
In statements recorded before a court under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), the two said their vehicle had not been stopped by robbers at Narval crossing. They alleged that the police later brought other men and firearms to the police station and made them sign documents without allowing them to read what was written.
Other witnesses told the inquiry that Rakesh Pathak and some of the other accused had been picked up from their homes while asleep. The weapons shown as recoveries allegedly included a licensed double-barrelled gun belonging to Rakesh’s father, Sadashiv Pathak, and a licensed rifle belonging to Devi Prasad.
The CB-CID found prima facie evidence against 18 policemen and recommended that an FIR be registered.
The case been registered under sections 194, 195, 182, 211, 218, 220, 323 and 342 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). These cover offences relating to fabricating false evidence, giving false information, making false criminal charges, falsifying official records, unlawful confinement and voluntarily causing hurt.
Six of those named have died: Vidyasagar Tripathi, Ramakant, Durvin Singh, Rajan Singh, Uday Shankar Pandey and Mahendra Singh. The surviving accused include BD Saraswat, Yogendra Nath Singh, Hriday Narayan Tiwari, Tej Narayan Tiwari, Vaijnath, Brajesh Kumar Sevarat, Chandrabali, Vidyakant Shukla, Ramasrey, Ramesh Kumar Tiwari, Jogeshwar Yadav, and Ramesh Chandra.
