New Delhi: Fabrication of evidence, incorrect entries in case diaries, pressure tactics to extort false statements and a concocted confession — this how the Haryana Police allegedly framed a bus conductor for the murder of a 7-year-old boy in a private school in Gurugram.
According to a CBI chargesheet, four policemen “knowingly fabricated the false evidence and prepared incorrect documents with an intention and knowledge to falsely implicate Ashok Kumar as an accused” in the 2017 case.
On 8 September 2017, a class 2 student was found inside the school premises with his throat slit. After the murder case was registered, the local police arrested Ashok Kumar, a school bus conductor, on the same day.
However, following widespread outrage, the case was later handed over to the CBI, which arrested a class 11 student of the same school for the murder.
The CBI filed a closure report against Kumar on 28 February 2018, giving him a clean chit in the case, while a chargesheet was filed against the delinquent juvenile.
Supported by the statements of school teachers, employees, Ashok Kumar’s colleagues as well as forensic experts, the CBI in its supplementary chargesheet detailed how the Haryana Police had “cooked up” the story to frame the bus conductor.
The central agency filed its supplementary chargesheet in the case before a special CBI court in Sonepat in January, almost three years after it began a separate probe against the policemen, including then ACP Birem Singh.
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Seizure memo and case diaries manipulated
According to the CBI, the Haryana Police had prepared the seizure memo naming Kumar much before he was either examined or arrested. While it was prepared at 3pm on 8 September 2017, Kumar was shown to be arrested at 9pm on the same day.
“This clearly proves that the accused police officials had made up their mind to falsely implicate him in the murder case without any evidence. For the said purpose they planted the evidence against him,” the chargesheet disclosed.
The probe further revealed that the police officer who had purportedly prepared the seizure memo was not present at the scene of crime. A scientific assistant, who was at the crime spot to pick up forensic evidence, confirmed this to the CBI.
Furthermore, the CBI noted that the victim’s school bag with blood stains was removed from the scene of the crime, and was taken to the child’s classroom and then to the conference hall to manipulate the evidence.
According to the chargesheet, multiple case diaries were prepared later to substantiate Kumar’s arrest. The diaries had wrong facts and important movements that were recorded on CCTV footage were either missing or blank.
As an example of flawed investigation, the CBI pointed out that in one of the case diaries, the police claimed that Kumar’s clothes were seized on the day of the murder. However, the bus conductor was wearing the same set of clothes during his media interview the next day.
“CBI investigation revealed that accused police officials has also fabricated false evidence, prepared false official records by manipulating the case diaries in the case and mentioned wrong and false facts in the case diaries to falsely implicate Ashok Kumar and to screen the real offender which is clear from the analysis of case diaries,” stated the chargesheet.
Bus conductor, witnesses pressurised to record incorrect statements
The CBI noted that Kumar’s disclosure statements, in which he had confessed to the murder, were extorted from him through physical torture and he never actually confessed to the crime.
The statements, it added, were prepared by the police officials at a later date on 11 September 2017, three days after the incident.
This has been substantiated by a woman constable who told the CBI that she wrote one of the confession statements on a pre-signed blank paper. None of the policemen, who claimed to be present during Kumar’s confession, were actually there, the CBI added.
Furthermore, Haryana Police’s charge that Ashok Kumar had hidden the weapon of offence — a knife — in the tool box of the bus, was also thrashed by the CBI, who noted that it was purchased by the delinquent juvenile a day before the incident.
On the basis of statements by a few school employees and a forensic expert, the CBI maintained Kumar also did not sexually assault the victim, as charged by the Haryana Police. Rather, he was called by a school teacher and another employee to help them carry the child to a vehicle so that he could be rushed to a nearby hospital.
One of the school employees, who had earlier given a statement against Kumar, told the CBI that he was forced to do so by the Haryana Police.
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Parents challenge Haryana govt’s decision
Despite such serious allegations against the policemen, the special CBI court has not been able to proceed with the case against them since the state has refused to accord sanction to prosecute them.
An order signed by Rajeev Arora, additional chief secretary of Haryana’s home department, said the evidence relied upon by the CBI showed some amount of “inaccurate discrepancy” in police documentation but does not prove any criminal intent and mens-rea (referring to criminal intent) on the officers’ part to wrongly implicate a person.
This order was placed before the Sonepat CBI court on 22 February, which adjourned the case to 19 March, after the victim’s family said they wanted to challenge it before the Punjab and Haryana High Court.
Sushil Tekriwal, the advocate representing the family, told ThePrint that the boy’s father has filed a writ petition in the Punjab and Haryana High Court to quash the order.
“This government order is in violation of several Supreme Court judgements that say that protection is granted to a public servant to make sure he or she does not become a victim to frivolous litigation. A state government is not required to appreciate evidence the way it has been done in this case by Haryana Government. This is a clear case of dereliction of duty on the part of the policemen,” Tekriwal said.
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