CID to probe role of ACB, petrol mafia in police torture case
N Ganesh
The State Crime Investigation Department (CID), who is
investigating allegations by one Sandip Singh who has accused the Thane
rural police of subjecting him to electric shocks to extract a statement
from him, will now have to examine the truth behind it.
Singh’s statement, which he had given while he was in police custody in
2003, is crucial to a MCOCA case that was initiated by Assistant Police
Inspector (API) Nitin Patil. Patil had accused senior officials of the
Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), including the Director General Rahul Gopal of
conniving with the petrol-adulteration mafia to frame him in a bogus case
Bombay High Court bench of Justices Ranjana Desai and DB Bhosale on Tuesday,
in a writ petition filed by API Patil, directed the CID to investigate the
contentions, documents and evidences, which will be provided by the
petitioner in the case.
In the event of the High Court order, the CID will now have to investigate
if there was any conspiracy hatched by ACB officials and the petrol
adulteration mafia, by verifying the contentions made in Singh’s statement.
The writ petition contented that the CID was not investigating whether there
was any truth in the statement given by Singh.
Advocate for API Patil Asmita Sarangdhar submitted before the court that the
CID was not considering documentary evidences provided by API Patil and was
thus conducting the investigation maliciously.
When the state sought six months to carry out investigations, the court
ordered an expedited probe. The bench also kept open the remedy for the
petitioners to approach the court in case of grievances regarding the
investigations carried out by the CID.
A year after Singh gave the statement to the police detailing the conspiracy
hatched by ACB-petrol adulteration mafia to trap API Patil in a bogus case,
he wrote to the ACB alleging torture. Assistant Commissioner of Police M B
Pawar had inquired in to Singh’s allegation. Pawar, in a report to the
Director General of Police (DGP), had concluded that there was no material
evidences to pursue the case and had recommended a departmental inquiry
against the police officers instead.
In September 2006, the DGP had directed the Inspector General of Konkan
region to lodge an FIR based on Singh allegations. Subsequently, Manor
police station in Thane rural, had lodged a FIR and had booked API Nitin
Patil, API IS Patil and API TK Borse in connection to the case.
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