Delhi police conducted sham investigation in `84 riots: CBI

New Delhi, Aug 27 (PTI) The CBI on Friday told the
Supreme Court that the special anti-riots cell of the Delhi
Police had conducted "sham investigations and farce
prosecutions" in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots to apparently shield
senior Congress leader and former MP Sajjan Kumar, a key
accused.
In an affidavit, the agency has urged the apex court
to vacate the August 13 stay granted by it and pleaded it
"seriously prejudiced" the prosecution against the Congress
leader.
A bench of Justices P Sathasivam and B S Chauhan while
taking on record the affidavit posted to September 7 the final
hearing of the agency's plea to prosecute Kumar for the riots
under Delhi Cantonment police station in which 60 people were
killed.
"Mr Dave nobody is insensitive," the bench said when
senior counsel Dushayant Dave appearing for one of the victims
asked the court to vacate the stay on the ground that it
involved the emotions of thousands of people.
The CBI, in its affidavit, said, "It will also be
adjudged during trial as to whether the petitioner (Kumar) has
played a role in causing delay. It cannot also be lost sight
of the fact that 24 complaints were investigated in one FIR
about scores of deaths and because of sham investigation and
farce prosecutions, there has been failure of justice for
which victims are aggrieved."
The agency questioned the intention of the anti-riot
cell of Delhi police in filing status reports on July 31, 2008
in the trial court when the investigation was already been
conducted by the CBI.
"There was no occasion for the Delhi Police to deal
with the case once the entire material was supplied to the CBI
by the government of India from the custody of Delhi Police
(on October 10, 2005)," the agency said.
The CBI also accused the Delhi police of filing
another status report in the trial court on July 31, 2008 and
pointed out that the trial judge and the Delhi High Court have
happily termed it as "clandestine attempt to hush up the
matter".
The CBI accused Kumar of attempting to drag the trial
on one pretext or the other and said his plea for staying the
trial was another such attempt.
"The present petition has been filed with the only
object of delaying the trial. It is well settled that at the
present stage of framing of charge, the material on record has
not to be examined meticulously by weighing it in golden
scale," the CBI said.
In other words, the agency argued that whether the
fresh charges framed against Kumar by the trial judge on May
15, 2010 was justified or not has to be examined at the stage
of the trial.
"A perusal of final report (chargesheet) would show
that there are direct allegations which are proved by evidence
against the petitioner (Kumar) about his involvement in the
commission of crime in the present case," the affidavit
stated.
Citing the apex court's earlier judgements, the CBI
said that at the stage of framing charges, no weight is to be
attached to the probable defence of the accused as such
matters has to be dealt at the trial. (More) PTI