‘Botched-up probe led to acquittal in Noida gang rape’

Delhi court pulled up the investigation officer of a 2009 case of gangrape of a 24-year-old MBA student saying he has left “no stone unturned” to botch up the investigation leading to the acquittal of nine persons on the grounds that the identity of the real culprits could not be proved.

Additional sessions judge Shail Jain held that the investigating officer Anil Samaniya has not followed proper procedure of law and has not conducted judicial Test Identification Parade of the accused.

According to the prosecution, the incident took place on the evening of January 5, 2009, when the girl, along with her male friend, was returning from the Great India Place Mall in their car. They were forcibly stopped by several youths who were returning on their motorcycles after a cricket match.

Brandishing cricket bats, four of the youths sat in the car. They beat up the girl and her friend, pushed them to the back seat and drove the car to a secluded place near Garhi Chaukhandi in Noida, police said.

At the isolated place, the other associates joined them and 11 persons allegedly gangraped the girl. They also took away their valuables like mobile phones, wrist watch and ATM cards, it said. The complaint was lodged with the Noida Police by the victim’s friend.

The accused in the case were Pushpender alias Tuiyan, Srikant, Sanjay, Gautam, Sudhir, Little, Omkar and Pushpender, Sashikant, Golu and a juvenile,

all residents of Garhi Chaukhandi. All of them were on bail, while Tuiyan died during trial.

In its verdict, the court said defective investigation has caused the loss of material evidence regarding connection of the accused with the offence, their identification, identification of the place of incident and the case property.

The judge said also held that the prosecution has not been able to prove through medical evidence any connection between the accused persons and the alleged offence.

Though the girl had identified all the accused before the court during the recording of her testimony, the judge said their identification by her was “doubtful” as the alleged crime was committed in the night in a forest area, where there was no sufficient light but the parking light and the dim light inside the car.