5 police officers get life imprisonment for 2006 fake encounter case in Etah

Four other police officers were sentenced to five years of imprisonment. They are convicted of killing Raja Ram, a carpenter, on August 18, 2006

A Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Ghaziabad on Wednesday sentenced five police officers to life imprisonment for murdering a carpenter in a fake encounter case in 2006 under the jurisdiction of Sidhpura police station in Etah district. Four other police officers were sentenced to five years of imprisonment.

The convicted police officers leave CBI court after their sentencing in Ghaziabad on Wednesday. (Sakib Ali/HT Photo)

The court pronounced life imprisonment for the then station house officer of Sidhpura police station Pawan Singh, sub-inspector Pal Singh Thenuwa, then sub-inspector Ajant Singh (who passed away during the trial), constables Sarnam Singh, Rajendra Prasad and Mohkam Singh for common intention, kidnapping, murder and destruction of evidence. The court also imposed a fine of ₹33,000 on each of them, said Vivek Gupta, one of the defence lawyers.

Constables Sumer Singh, Baldev Prasad, Ajay Kumar and Avdhesh Rawat were sentenced to five years of imprisonment and fined ₹11,000 each for destruction of evidence and common intention, Gupta added.

SP Chaudhary, the defence lawyer representing Pawan Singh, said, “Once we get the copy of the judgment delivered on Wednesday, we will appeal to the high court.”

On August 18, 2006, Raja Ram, a carpenter, was picked up by a team of five police officers from Sidhpura police station at 3pm.

According to the prosecution, Ram and wife, Santosh Kumari, were heading to meet her ailing sister at Pehloi village along with his two brothers, Shiv Prakash and Ashok Kumar, when the police officers picked him up. The officers told Ram’s family that they were taking him for questioning and would release him the next day.

Later, Santosh Kumari came to know that an unidentified man who was gunned down in a police encounter was her husband, Ram. She approached the Allahabad high court, which on June 1, 2007 directed CBI to take up the investigation.

The court held all the nine officers guilty under respective sections in their chargesheet on Tuesday and scheduled the sentencing on Wednesday.

It was contended that to make the case real, the policemen on August 18, 2006 prepared a fake seizure memo and also made fake entries to the general diary in order to portray the encounter as genuine.

The defence lawyers said that the prosecution produced 78 witnesses during the trial, including family members of the deceased man.

CBI’s public prosecutor Anurag Modi was unavailable for comment.