ASI who forced acid into drug accused’s mouth booked

: CBI’s special crime branch has booked an assistant sub-inspector (ASI) for allegedly pouring acid into the mouth of a man arrested in a drug case to extract confession from him.

A case under Section 326-A (punishment for acid throwing) of Indian Penal Code was registered against ASI Gyan Ishwar Singh, who was posted at the Phillaur police station at the time of the incident, by the agency which started probe into the case following the Punjab and Haryana high court’s December 15 order.

The alleged incident came to the notice of the high court after a man arrested in a drug case filed for bail. He accused the same ASI of falsely implicating him in the case and then raping his wife.

The CBI on December 27, 2018, had arrested him for the woman’s rape and taking money from her on the promise of releasing her husband and even strip-searching her at the police station.

The complainant in the acidpouring case, Joga Ram, said he was picked from his house on April 13, 2018, by Gyan Ishwar and three other cops and was tortured by them before pouring acid into his mouth.

The ASI had claimed that Joga consumed the acid kept in a plastic bottle in a public toilet when he was apprehended by a police team.

Joga’s counsel told the court that the ASI was put under suspension and a magisterial inquiry was ordered against him in the acid pouring into the mouth of Joga Ram who was also arrested under the NDPS Act.

The high court handed over probe into both the cases to the CBI. On January 30, 2019, HC ordered that the man booked at the Maqsudan police station under the NDPS Act be released as the CBI found in its probe that he was falsely implicated.