31 October 2018

Newsscroll | Source: PTI

Hashimpura case: HC allows Swamy's plea to make public report of CB-CID of UP Police

(Eds: Adds more details from proceedings, judgement)

New Delhi, Oct 31 (PTI) The Delhi High Court Wednesday allowed BJP leader Subramanian Swamy's plea to make public the report of Uttar Pradesh police's CB-CID in the 1987 massacre of Muslims at Hashimpura locality in Meerut, in which it sentenced 16 former police personnel to life imprisonment.

A bench of Justices S Muralidhar and Vinod Goel, however, declined Swamy's plea for further probe by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) into the massacre.

The high court in its judgment noted that in the over three decades since the massacre, no significant developments are stated to have taken place nor any leads have been unearthed that warrant the direction for further SIT probe.

"However, this will not preclude the concerned investigating agency from further pursuing the matter in accordance with law. It will be open for the petitioner (Swamy) too, if he has any further material, to share it with such agency to facilitate the exercise," the court asked.

The plea for further SIT probe was sought by Swamy in his appeal challenging the dismissal of his earlier petition in the trial court for probe in the case.

In his high court plea, Swamy had also challenged the acquittal of the 16 former PAC personnel by the trial court.

He had contended in his plea, filed through advocate Ramni Taneja, that further investigation was required as the CB-CID report had indicted 66 personnel of the Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC), but charge sheet was filed against only 19 of them.

He had also urged the court to make public the Crime Branch - Central Investigation Department's (CB-CID) report submitted in 1994 after being handed the probe in 1988.

In his petition, he had said he was moving the high court to seek "further investigation into the alleged role of other involved persons who due to their social position and political clout have remained untouched".

During the proceedings in the high court, Swamy had termed the killings as genocide and he wanted the crime to be prosecuted as such by holding a re-trial.

Apart from that, Swamy in his arguments had also urged the high court to order an investigation into whether the then Union Minister of State for Home Affairs (P Chidambaram) held a closed door meeting in Meerut with PAC officers just prior to the Hashimpura massacre.

He had also wanted it to be investigated whether at the meeting, the then Union Minister of State for Home Affairs and then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Veer Bahadur Singh, had allegedly sanctioned or directed the PAC to carry out the killings.

The high court in its two-page judgement disposing of Swamy's plea has not referred to these arguments by him. PTI HMP SKV RKS SA

Disclaimer: This story has not been edited by Outlook Staff and is auto-generated from news agency feeds. Source: PTI