Bengaluru: Karnataka high court on Tuesday issued interim directions to the authorities to strictly adhere to Supreme Court guidelines regarding the body of the person from Bihar killed in the April 13 incident in Hubballi. The man was shot dead hours after he allegedly raped and murdered a five-year-old girl.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice NV Anjaria and Justice KV Aravind issued this direction after hearing a PIL filed by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) Karnataka and Madhu Bhushan, a women’s rights activist.
“It is further provided that the body of the accused shall be subjected to post-mortem by a team of two doctors at the local hospital… It is directed that videography shall be undertaken for the entire duration of the post-mortem. It’s also provided that the authorities shall preserve samples of the parts of the body collected during the process of post-mortem, to be made available as may be required for investigation,” the bench said while referring to the Supreme Court’s decision in a PUCL and state of Maharashtra case. The hearing was adjourned to April 24 and the state govt told to file an affidavit.
Earlier, appearing for the petitioners, senior advocate Aditya Sondhi submitted that the body of the deceased has to be preserved by the respondent authorities so that evidence, as may be required during investigation, is available. He further said if the body is cremated, the evidence would be lost and the rule of law would suffer.
No cremation
Appearing for the govt, advocate-general Shashikiran Shetty told the court that an FIR was registered and the matter was handed over to the Criminal Investigation Department. He further said in such cases, the body will not be cremated, only buried.
“The question of cremation of the body doesn’t arise as in such cases. The body, if at all given to the family upon identification, would be permitted to be buried only so that it can be exhumed at a later point of time in the course of the investigation,” he explained.
The petitioners have stated that the police’s version doesn’t complete the chain of events and is contradictory in nature. There is no clear basis for how police concluded that the accused was behind the child’s murder. It is alleged that the accused was suspected and identified based on CCTV footage and on the basis of his confession in police custody. It’s not clear if the procedure established by law was followed, they added.
“It is clear the accused was in police custody, thus completely unarmed. Further, (there are) serious concerns over how the single accused could have overpowered and assaulted at least three police personnel. There are multiple versions of the police’s accounts being put into the public domain, specifically with regard to the bullet wounds sustained by the accused. Therefore, it is in the interest of justice to preserve the body for further investigation,” PUCL stated.
The body of the accused is an important piece of evidence in this case and must be examined by independent agencies before cremation, the petitioners added while seeking a stay on cremation.