Verdict in ’81 Behmai massacre case deferred to Jan 24

KANPUR: Verdict in the Behmai massacre case was deferred on Saturday for the third time this month after the court found the original copy of the case diary missing from the records.

Special judge, anti-dacoity, Sanjiv Singh issued notice to the court clerk, Rajendra Yadav, and fixed January 24 as the next date for the verdict. The yet another deferment of the verdict elicited angry response from complainant Rajaram Singh and the families of those killed 39 years ago.

Singh said the court knew about the missing document all along then why did it fix the date for pronouncing the verdict. “It’s like keeping a thirty person off water,” he said in Mati, Akbarpur of Kanpur Dehat district.

The trial in one of most-talked-about cases was completed on December 17, 2018, and the court had fixed January 6 for the verdict. But the lawyers of the five accused asked the court for some more time to file certain citations of high court and the Supreme Court. The court had given them till January 16 to file the citations and told them it would decide the case on January 18.

District governing counsel Raju Porwal said the case diary is an essential document and the court has issued notice to the court clerk. The verdict would be pronounced on the next date. Twenty people were killed on February 14, 1981, by a group of bandits led by late Phoolan Devi in Behmai. But the trial in the case started in 2012 and that, too, on five of 28 accused.

The five accused are Posa, Bheekha, Vishwanath alias Putani, Shyam Babu and Ram Singh. Posa and Bheekha were arrested in 2017.

It has been a long wait for the Behmai widows — 10 of the 20 have also died. One of the complainants, Munni Devi, said their sentiments were being hurt with the delay. “I knew it will happen this time too; they killed our men and they are exploiting legal system. I have not much hope left in me,” she said from Behmai.