New Delhi:
The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to consider granting hearing on Wednesday on one of the PILs seeking an SIT probe into the killing of four men, arrested on charge of gangrape and murder of a veterinarian in Telangana, by police in an alleged encounter. On Friday morning, the four suspects were shot dead while in police custody. According to the police, the four men were taken to the crime scene as part of the investigation. The police claimed that the accused persons attacked them with sticks, snatched their weapons and opened fire. All of them were shot dead in the “cross firing,” the police said.
A bench headed by Chief Justice S A Bobde took note of the submissions of lawyer G S Mani that the plea seeking independent investigation against the police officials concerned be listed for hearing urgently.
Another advocate M L Sharma has also filed a similar petition saying the SIT probe should be monitored by former apex court judges.
The PIL filed by Mani and lawyer Pradeep Kumar Yadav claimed that the alleged encounter was "fake" and FIR should be lodged against police officials who were involved in the incident.
Following the encounter, questions were raised on the police theory with several activists alleging “extra judicial” killings. The police, however, said that they acted in self-defence. The Telangana High Court directed the state government to preserve bodies of the four suspects in Hyderabad veterinarian rape and murder case, who were shot dead in police custody.
The high court also ordered to conduct the post-mortem on camera and video of the procedure be handed over to the Principal District Judge, Mahabubnagar in form of Compact Disc and pen-drive. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) also took cognisance of the encounter killings of the four accused in the case and ordered a probe.
