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Synopsis

The Delhi High Court on Monday upheld the conviction and 10-year sentence awarded to five Uttar Pradesh policemen for custodial torture of a 26-year-old man, Sonu alias Somveer causing his death in 2006.

The division bench of Justice Mukta Gupta and Justice Anish Dayal was dealing with pleas by the convicted UP policemen’s, Hindveer Singh, Mahesh Mishra, Pradeep Kumar, Pushpendra Kumar, Haripal Singh, and Kunwar Pal Singh challenging the conviction and sentence awarded by the Karkardooma Court, Delhi in March 2019.

“The Ld. Trial Court has rightly convicted the said accused for the offences and the appeals by the accused viz. CRL.A. 488/2019, CRL.A. 499/2019, CRL.A. 537/2019, CRL.A. 622/2019 and CRL.A. 624/2019 are, therefore, dismissed and the conviction and sentence awarded by the learned trial court are upheld”, the bench held.

High Court has also upheld the three-year jail term awarded to the sixth convict, Inspector Kunwar Pal Singh, for kidnapping the victim.

While dismissing the appeals filed by the policemen against their conviction and sentence, the bench observed, “The said sequence of events and evidence on record suggest that the deceased was subjected to custodial torture with the knowledge that it was likely to cause death of the deceased but without any intention to cause the death”.

“Therefore, the act of causing bodily injury, as is likely to cause death, would make the accused guilty of offence punishable under Section 304 IPC Part I and liable for a sentence for RI 10 years. Thus, the appeals filed by the complainant for converting the convictions for offence punishable under Section 304 IPC to Section 302 IPC cannot be sustained and therefore are dismissed”, it ordered.

On September 2, 2006, an FIR was registered under Section 302 of IPC at Noida police station, UP by Dalbir Singh (father of one the deceased). It was alleged that on September 1, 2006, at 6pm, the Noida police in civil dress took away his son Sonu alias Somveer from the village. He also alleged that on September 2, he received information from the police station that his son had committed suicide.

Dalbir Singh said he had a serious apprehension that his son was murdered by the police, and on reaching the place of the post-mortem along with his co-villagers he saw various injuries on the body of Sonu, including burn mark near his ear. He alleged that his son was murdered by the police after being tortured and it had been given a colour of suicide.

Upon investigation by CB-CID, a chargesheet was filed against the accused persons, who were police officials. It was stated that six accused had taken Sonu aged 26 years at about 6:30 pm on September 1, 2006, in civil dress in connivance with Inspector Kunwar Pal Singh, without any justifiable reason from his house and brought to Nithari police station in their private vehicle in relation to the crime case registered under Section 392 IPC at Sector 39 Noida.

“Later, on the next day i.e. September 2, 2006, Sonu was lodged in the locker of Sector 20 police station at 3:25am. Due to a false implication in a robbery case and on account of atrocities caused by the police, Sonu due to physical and unbearable mental stress, allegedly committed suicide and was found hanging in the lockup at about 5:30 pm”, the chargesheet stated.

The chargesheet was filed under Sections 342, 320, 306, 167, 218, 34 of IPC and charges were framed against all the accused persons on December 19, 2011.

Case Title: Sh. Pradeep Kumar vs. State of U.P (a batch of petitions)