Custody of Zaidi, 7 other cops extended till Nov 20

SHIMLA The lower court has extended the judicial custody of IG police Zahur Zaidi and seven other cops till November 20 in connection with the custodial death of an accused in the Kotkhai rape and murder case. Since no one appeared on behalf of the cops, the court will not hear the petition of CBI seeking permission to conduct voice sampling test of the cops on November 20.

On November 15, the CBI had filed an application seeking the court’s nod to conduct voice sampling test of eight cops including IG police S Zahur Zaidi. Besides Zaidi, the CBI had arrested deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Manoj Joshi, sub-inspector (SI) Rajinder Singh, and assistant sub-inspector (ASI) Deep Chand Sharma, head constables Surat Singh, Mohan Lal, Rafiq Ali and Ranjit Singh on August 29. Their remand was to expire on Friday but the lower court extended the custody till November 20.

The high court had also set November 30 as the deadline for the filing of the chargesheet in the custodial death case. In the Kotkhai rape and murder case, police had arrested Ashish Chauhan, 29, Rajender Singh, 32, Subhash Singh Bisht, 42, Deepak alias Deepu, 29, and Lok Jung, 19, on July 13. On July 15, the state recommended CBI probe in the case.

The CBI took all the accused into custody and also took them to Ahmedabad for a narco test, however, the central agency is yet to file a comprehensive status report in the high court.

Earlier, the CBI court had denied bail to Zaidi, who had applied for bail after the accused in rape and murder case was granted bail.