Delhi Violence: Court Grants Bail to Accused, Questions Witness Statements

A Delhi Court has granted bail to a person arrested for his role during the Delhi violence of February 2020, while observing that the witness accounts of the constables were discredited by Delhi High Court while granting bail to a co-accused in the case. Additional Sessions Judge, Karkardooma, Vinod Yadav observed that the applicant deserved bail on the ground of parity as two other co-accused were already enlarged on bail.

The FIR was lodged against Kasim in March 2020 based on information received from Sushrat Trauma Centre regarding gunshot injury sustained by Prince Bansal, aged 19. The police recorded his statement wherein he stated that on February 25, 2020 he had gone to buy a few things and near Lakhpat school he noticed that a riotous mob was pelting stones, throwing petrol bombs and firing gunshots from the terrace of the house belonging to principal accused Tahir Hussain and suddenly one of the persons from the said riotous mob fired upon him, as a result of which he sustained gunshot injury.

The counsel for the applicant submitted that two other co-accused, Tanveer malik and Shah Alam, had already been enlarged on bail and thus, bail be granted on the ground of parity. Further, the applicant was granted bail in two other FIRs lodged against him. He further argued that the applicant has been falsely implicated in the matter by the investigating agency just because he was declared “Bad Character” in Dayalpur area. It was further argued that applicant has neither been specifically named in the FIR nor recovery of any sort has been effected from him. Further there was no CCTV footage against him and his Test Identification Parade was also not conducted. Further it was contended that there is an unexplained delay of 5 days in the registration of FIR, from the date of incident. Furthermore, statements of the injured and other primary witnesses are all undated and no explanation was provided for the same. Further, the applicant was claimed to have been witnessed by two constables committing the offence however, the court questioned why they waited till the registration of FIR to name the applicant.

The court concluded that the prosecutor was unable to establish that the role assigned to the applicant is not similar to the role attributed to co-accused Tanveer Malik in the matter.

The court accepted the contentions of the applicant and observed that the injured has not specifically named the applicant in his complaint. The court observed that the statements of the witnesses are undated and no call at number 100 was made by the aforesaid witnesses on the date of incident. The court also pointed out that in the chargesheet, the role attributed to applicant is merely of stone pelting and taking active part in the rioting activity, “investigation in the matter is complete and chargesheet has already been filed; trial in the matter is likely to take long time; applicant cannot be made to incarcerate in jail for infinity merely on account of the fact that other persons who were part of the riotous mob have to be identified and arrested in the matter,” the court held.

The court held that the applicant deserved bail on the ground of parity and granted him bail on his furnishing a Personal Bond in the sum of Rs.20,000 with one surety in the like amount subject to the condition that he shall not tamper with the evidence or influence any witness in any manner; he shall maintain peace and harmony in the locality and that he shall appear before the Court on each and every date of hearing to attend the proceedings; he shall furnish his mobile number to SHO, PS Dayalpur upon his release from the jail and will ensure the same to be in working condition and further he shall also get installed “Aarogya Setu App” in his mobile phone.

The order may be read here:

Courtesy: Sabrang India