Bhubaneswar: Twelve years after the abduction and murder of two sharpshooters, a sessions court in Cuttack on Thursday acquitted the prime accused, history-sheeter siblings Dhala Samanta brothers, along with eight others, citing the prosecution’s failure to provide sufficient evidence.
Cuttack district and sessions judge Sitikantha Samal said that the brothers — Sushil Dhala Samanta and Sushanta Dhala Samanta — are acquitted in the abduction and murder case of sharpshooter Manoj Kumar Mallick alias Dipu and associate Ommprakash Swain, as the prosecution failed to prove the ‘use’ of the arms under Section 27 of the Arms Act or their ‘sale, transfer, etc.’ under Section 25 (1-AA) of the Arms Act.
The gangster duo, however, were found guilty under Sections 25(1-A) (possession of prohibited arms or prohibited ammunition) and 25(1-B)(a) of the Arms Act. They were sentenced to seven years of rigorous imprisonment and fined ₹10,000 each, as they were found in possession of firearms such as carbines and .22 pistols.
“The case solely rested on circumstantial evidence, as there is no direct evidence, ocular or documentary, against the accused persons that they have committed the murder of the alleged deceased Dipu alias Manoj Kumar Mallick and Omm alias Omprakash Swain, except the alleged abduction on 12.11.2013, and the parents of Mallick had seen both of them for the last time on that day at 11 pm in Cuttack with the accused. The law on circumstantial evidence speaks that there must be a complete chain of evidence leading to the conclusion that the accused is the only person who could have committed the offence and no one else. The prosecution has failed to establish the necessary links so as to complete the chain of circumstances,” the trial court said in its order while acquitting the 10 accused.
{{/usCountry}}“The case solely rested on circumstantial evidence, as there is no direct evidence, ocular or documentary, against the accused persons that they have committed the murder of the alleged deceased Dipu alias Manoj Kumar Mallick and Omm alias Omprakash Swain, except the alleged abduction on 12.11.2013, and the parents of Mallick had seen both of them for the last time on that day at 11 pm in Cuttack with the accused. The law on circumstantial evidence speaks that there must be a complete chain of evidence leading to the conclusion that the accused is the only person who could have committed the offence and no one else. The prosecution has failed to establish the necessary links so as to complete the chain of circumstances,” the trial court said in its order while acquitting the 10 accused.
{{/usCountry}}The Dhala Samantas, nicknamed the D brothers, ran a major tender-fixing and extortion racket and were part of a large inter-state illicit arms trade network that supplied weapons to small-time criminals. After Sushil was arrested in Bhubaneswar in 2009, Sushanta fled to Visakhapatnam, leaving the crime network under the supervision of Mallick and Swain.
In the absence of the Dhala Samanta brothers, both Mallick and Swain gradually took over the reins, which angered the gangster siblings. After Sushil was released from jail on bail in 2012, the brothers took Mallick and Swain to their office in Cuttack and assaulted them. They were then taken to the farmhouse at Khuntakata, where they were strangled to death. Their bodies were allegedly disposed of by burning them under a culvert at Ghasipulia on the Gua-Kiribur Road in West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand.
Two years later, Mallick’s father Adwaita and Swain’s wife Mani filed complaint petitions in the court of the sub-divisional judicial magistrate (Sadar), Cuttack. The court then directed the police to register an FIR at the Chauliaganj police station in 2016.
Mallick’s father told the court that his family was afraid to report his son’s disappearance to the local police, as the Dhala Samantas were “professional criminals.” He alleged that although he reported the matter at the Chauliaganj police station on January 4, 2014, no FIR was registered. Even a visit to the criminal investigation department (CID) proved unsuccessful, as they demanded a copy of the FIR from the police station.
The court observed that there was an “unexplained and inordinate delay in filing the complaint petition” regarding the alleged abduction of Mallick and Swain. The two-year delay, coupled with the ample opportunities the complainants had to report the matter to the police or court, “not only affected the genuineness of this case but also created doubt on the claim of evidence of families of the deceased.”
The court also found significant doubts and inconsistencies in the evidence and procedures, such as the motive for the murder, confessional statements, spot identification, DNA sample collection, and the lack of a test identification parade to identify the six persons seen at the site of the alleged murder — all of which weakened the case.