High court hands over probe to Bureau of Investigation

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab and Haryana high court has handed over the probe into a drugs seizure FIR registered by the Amritsar police to Bureau of Investigation (BOI), Punjab.

The high court bench of justice Vikas Bahl acted on the plea of wives of both the accused, Varinder Singh, alias Goldy, and Harpreet Singh, who had sought transfer of the case to some independent agency claiming that the duo had been falsely implicated in the case. The FIR was registered on February 13, 2021, on the allegations of seizure of 300gm of heroin when, according to the police, they were arrested at 10.30pm from Dubarji Turnin Amritsar on the day of the FIR. However, in the plea before the HC, it was claimed that they were picked up at 8.10pm from a parking of the Best Price showroom.

The plea said that Varinder, who was a booth-level officer was implicated as he helped the husband of a candidate of the AAP during the Patti municipal committee polls. When bail pleas of both the accused were considered by the HC earlier this year, a report from the district and sessions judge, Amritsar, was sought. Later, they were granted bail.

After going through the CCTV footage, the district and sessions judge said movement of some persons was noticed in the parking lot around 8.08pm from where petitioners claimed that their husbands were detained. It was also recorded that some persons were taken in a car at 8.11pm and at 8.13pm, a man came back and took another car out of the parking at 8:26 pm.

“The allegations, when seen in the light of the report of the district and sessions judge cannot be ignored.. merely because the ACP found the FIR based on facts, the same would not come in the way of HC in passing the orders.