Delhi court acquits six persons in 2020 riots case

New Delhi, July 26 (IANS) A Delhi court has acquitted six men in a case linked to the 2020 Northeast Delhi riots, rebuking the prosecution for its failure to prove their identity and role in the alleged offences.

The six men — Rajendar Jha, Tejveer Chaudhary, Rajesh Jha, Govind Singh Manral, Peetamber Jha, and Devender Kumar alias Monu Pandit — had been charged with a range of offences including rioting, robbery, unlawful assembly, and arson, based on a chargesheet filed by Khajuri Khas police station.

Pointing to “serious discrepancies” emerging during the prosecution evidence, Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Parveen Singh, in an order passed on July 23, said that the prosecution completely failed to explain them.

“The prosecution has completely failed to prove its case against any of the accused persons for any of the charges that were framed against them. All the accused are accordingly acquitted of all the charges framed against them,” ASJ Singh said.

The court added that the prosecution failed to conclusively establish the identity of the accused as part of the riotous mob.

It said it was unclear how head constable Vipin Tomar (Prosecution Witness 5) — who accompanied the investigating officer (IO) — was able to identify the accused individuals.

The credibility of the police witness was further compromised, the court observed, when it was revealed that he had taken photographs of the accused in his phone on the day of his testimony, but later deleted them.

The deleted photographs were recovered from his phone's trash folder.

“An adverse inference has to be drawn that he had done so to ascertain their identity,” ASJ Singh said, adding that head constable Tomar’s testimony was inconsistent with the site plan prepared during the course of investigation.

The court said that it will be “dangerous to rely upon the testimony of PW5” that the accused were part of the mob responsible for looting, arson, and vandalism targeting the homes and shops of residents including Gulzar, Altaf, Irshad, Alka Gupta, Vikas Sharma, and Satish Chand Sharma.

The acquittal of all six accused marks yet another setback for the Delhi Police, adding to a growing list of riot-related cases where courts have censured investigative lapses.

--IANS

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