HC orders fresh probe in custodial death case

The youth died under mysterious circumstances at Shegaon police station

The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court recently pulled up the Superintendent of Police, Buldhana for filing a "dissatisfactory" reply and not considering the evidence that indicated possible custodial death of a youth in the district, in April 2019.

A bench of Justices Sunil Shukre and Avinash Gharote also ordered a fresh probe in the matter and has asked the Superintendent of Police to personally look into the matter and make efforts to unearthed the truth.

The bench was seized with a plea filed by the mother of the young boy Gauresh (name changed), who died in mysterious circumstances while in custody of the officers at Shegaon police station.

Pursuant to an earlier hearing, the cops, accused to have tortured the boy, filed their replies before the judges.

In the replies, the cops admitted that Gauresh was in their custody, however, trashed the contention of custodial death or torture. They claimed that the deceased was in a disturbed state of mind and thus banged his head on the walls of the lock-up.

"However, the officers have disputed that any harm was deliberately caused to him at police station. The explanation given in the reply is inconsistent with the version of the deceased's mother and also with the information that was received at another police station, in respect of untimely death of Gaurav," the bench noted.

The judges further said that now the burden of explaining his death under suspicious circumstances is over to the accused cops.