‘It’s serious’: SC to hear plea into UP encounters

NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday said it will next month hold a detailed hearing on a petition seeking special probe into the spate of police encounters in Uttar Pradesh.

The top court bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi and j ust i c e s Ashok Bhushan and SK Kaul, perused the material on record and said issues raised in the petition by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) required “serious consideration” and fixed the hearing on February 12.

The top court was hearing a petition that asked for a courtmonitored probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) or a special investigation team into the police encounters that witnessed a spike after chief minister Yogi Adityanath took charge in February 2017.

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the Uttar Pradesh government, however, claimed all norms and procedures were followed by the state administration.

Earlier, the apex court had sought response from the state government on the PIL filed by the NGO, alleging that there were about 1,100 encounters in 2017 in which 49 people were killed and 370 injured.

The NGO, in its plea, referred to news reports quoting chief minister Yogi Adityanath, his deputy Keshav Prasad Maurya and additional director general of police (law and order) Anand Kumar justifying encounter killings of criminals in the state.