State appoints retired judges to probe Beed, Parbhani deaths

Maharashtra govt forms judicial committees to probe Beed sarpanch Santosh Deshmukh's murder and Parbhani protestor's custodial death, reports due in 6 months.

MUMBAI: Three weeks after the announcement of a judicial probe into the killing of Beed sarpanch Santosh Deshmukh, and the alleged custodial death of a protestor in the Constitution desecration case, the state government has announced committees under retired judges for both cases. The Beed sarpanch case will be investigated by Bombay High Court retired justice ML Tahiliani, while the Parbhani death will be probed by retired high court justice VL Achaliya.

State appoints retired judges to probe Beed, Parbhani deaths

The single-member committee will probe whether any person or any organisation was responsible for the killing of the sarpanch, whether the police and district administration had deployed adequate forces, whether the steps taken by the police were adequate, and whether any police officer was responsible for it. The committee has also been mandated to recommend steps to avoid a repetition of such an incident.

The terms of reference for the committee appointed for the Parbhani violence and death of Somnath Suryawanshi, one of the protesters, are same as that of the committee appointed for the Beed killing. The committee has, however, also been asked to probe the sequence of the incident, what triggered it, and its repercussions.

Both committees have been asked to submit their reports within six months.

Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on December 20 had announced a judicial probe into both cases, after an uproar over both cases during the winter session of the state legislature.

Somnath Suryawanshi was one of the protestors arrested after violence broke out in Parbhani on December 10 over the desecration of a replica of the Constitution. He died in police custody five days later. The opposition had raised the issue of excessive force used against the protesters, who were largely from the Dalit community. The claimed that Suryawanshi died owing to injuries sustained due to excessive force and atrocities committed by the police.