Justice Jain to oversee Lakhimpur probe: SC
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court Wednesday appointed justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, former judge of the Punjab and Haryana high court, to supervise on day-to-day basis the Uttar Pradesh SIT’s probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in which eight people, including four farmers and a journalist, were killed on October 3.
A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) NV Ramana and justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli also took note of the names of the Indian Police Service (IPS) officers provided by the state government, and appointed three officials as part of the state special investigation team (SIT).
“Now we have verified and contacted the concerned judge we had thought of. This is justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana high court, and he will monitor the ongoing investigation so as to ensure transparency and fairness,” the bench said as the proceedings commenced in the case registered by the top court on its own motion (suo motu).
The apex court further said that the UP SIT will have to be re-constituted to accommodate the three IPS officers, including the inspector general rank officer Padmaja Chauhan.
The other IPS officers are SB Shirodkar and Deepinder Singh.
“The investigation will be continued by the SIT under the supervision of the former high court judge and the matter will be listed again after the charge sheet and the status report filed by the learned judge,” the bench said.
The UP government on November 15 had agreed to the apex court’s suggestion that a former judge of its choice may be appointed to supervise the state SIT’s probe.
Over the last few hearings, the top court has been critical of the manner in which the state police have so far conducted the investigation in the case where eight people died in that incident on October 3 -- four farmers, three Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers, and a journalist.
On November 8, the bench
pulled up the UP Police, commenting that the investigation into the Lakhimpur Kheri incident appears to be favouring the “main accused” in the case.
The remarks continued the trend of the top court’s dissatisfaction with the probe in the case where a convoy, in which at least one vehicle belonged to Union minister Ajay Mishra ‘Teni’, ran over farmers protesting three controversial laws, leading them to run amok and lynch some of the occupants of the vehicles.
Ashish Mishra, the son of the minister, is one of the accused in one of the two cases (the convoy running over farmers) being investigated.His arrest came only after the bench, on October 9, criticised the lenient treatment he seemed to be receiving from the police in the murder FIR. The other case being investigated by the police relates to the lynching of some of the occupants of vehicles in the convoy. In the last hearing, the Supreme Court was perturbed that some of the evidence being collected in this case was aimed at protecting the “main accused” The state maintained that it has “clinching evidence” of Mishra’s presence at the scene (something he and his father have consistently denied), but that forensic reports on this are awaited. The bench had then underscored the need for appointing a retired HC judge from outside the state to monitor the probe after noticing that the investigation in the farmers’ murder case (FIR no. 219) could be adversely impacted by the manner in which the Uttar Pradesh police were recording evidence in the case relating to the murder of three BJP workers (FIR no. 220). It added that the court does not have confidence in the judicial commission appointed by the UP government. On October 7, the UP government set up a judicial commission, headed by retired Allahabad HC judge, justice PK Srivastava, to probe the incident.