NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday said it is appalled how Vikas Dubey was out of jail despite having 63 criminal cases against him and observed that it is a failure of the system.A bench of Chief Justice of India S A Bobde said, “We are appalled that such a person with so many cases was released on bail and he killed eight policemen. This shows the failure of the system. Give us an accurate report of all the orders passed in his case.”
“As a state, you must maintain the rule of law. And the rule of law requires arrest, trial and conviction. We can understand that here you say that the accused challenged the authority of the police but as a state, there has to be a rule of law,” remarked Justice Bobde.The court has asked Solicitor General Tushar Mehta who was appearing for Rajasthan Government to file the response by Wednesday.
During the hearing, senior advocate Harish Salve, representing the state Director General of Police, said policemen cannot be demoralised, the CJI retorted that it will not be the question when the rule of law is strengthened.Meanwhile, Mehta told the bench that their government is willing to include a former Supreme Court judge and a retired senior police officer for the judicial inquiry.
However, CJI said, the state government will have to reconstitute the committee on judicial inquiry, which presently is headed by a retired Allahabad High Court judge. Mehta accepted the bench’s views and said a draft notification with the name of a former Supreme Court judge and retired police officials will be submitted in the court on Wednesday. The bench will the pass its order.
The bench accepted UP Police’s submission that Dubey’s encounter bore no similarities with the Telangana killings where the state police had shot down four men accused of rape-cum-murder of a veterinarian.
Meanwhile, advocate Sanjay Parikh, appearing for PUCL, pointed out that the NGO has already questioned more than 40 encounter killings before Dubey. He also read our certain political statements reportedly made on UP encounters