Slamming Delhi Police for inordinate delay and lacunae in the Sunanda Pushkar murder probe, the High Court on Wednesday gave ultimatum of 15 days to come up with final report on the probe details. The Bench comprising Justices GS Sistani and Chander Shekhar pulled up Delhi Police and asked why such a delay in reaching to a conclusion in a case of “unnatural death”.
The Bench refused to give private audience to DCP South district Ishwar Singh, as requested by the Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Sanjay Jain. Judges said whatever Delhi Police has to say should be put on an affidavit within 15 days and they will examine that on next hearing on September 21. Earlier the ASG submitted that the court could talk to senior Delhi Police officials involved with the case inside the chamber as there was no laxity on part of it in investigating the matter. Delhi Police was supposed to file detailed affidavit on the probe on August 30. Instead of filing it sought more time. ASG claimed that the delay was not at the individual level but due to the delay in getting the scientific reports.
On hearing this, the bench said it was not fair to look into or monitor the investigation, but would “certainly like to know where the investigation stands as of today.”
“The incident is of January 2014 and we are in middle of 2017. It’s almost over three years but nothing concrete has come as of today,” the bench said, adding “certainly it cannot be unending”. “We have no hesitation to look into your report, but it is a bad habit to monitor the probe,” it said.
Opposing Delhi Police for buying time, main petitioner Dr Subramanian Swamy pointed out that Delhi Police was wasting time by finding the nature of the poison. He said within next day, AIIMS found that it was an unnatural case of death and death was by poison. But Delhi Police first probe team goofed up and made lot of wrong doings in basic evidence collection. Many crucial evidences were destroyed and delays were created to send to abroad labs, even after AIIMS reiterated its findings.
Swamy also pointed out that Delhi Police Economic Offences Wing had found the role of IPl betting racket and files were now given to Enforcement Directorate. Swamy and co-petitioner Ishkaran Bhandari have alleged that “inordinate delay” has been caused in the probe “which is a blot on the justice system”. They pointed out that Delhi Police was supposed to file final status report on probe on August 30.
The court posted the matter after two weeks and said that by then the ASG himself should look into the status of the investigation. “If you are with some different report on the development of the probe after two weeks, it’s okay. Otherwise we will look into it. Before we get into it, we will wait for two more weeks and see what you have come up with,” the bench said.
