A case of missing children and the finding of their amputated body parts wrenched our guts in December 2006. Headlines screamed the unfolding of manic evil in the village of Nithari in Noida, Uttar Pradesh when the skeletal remains of eight children were found in a drain behind Moninder Singh Pandher’s house; more body parts were found later.
Most of the remains were of poor children and young women who had gone missing from the area. Their hapless parents had filed missing complaints but there had been no headway. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took over the case within ten days and its search resulted in the recovery of more bones.
Almost two decades later, on Monday, the Allahabad High Court acquitted the two men at the centre of the macabre carnage—the prime accused Surinder Koli and Pandher, who had been given the death sentence by a trial court. The high court’s ruling cited the shoddiness of the probe and a lack of hard evidence. The court censured the Uttar Pradesh police and the CBI.
“The casual and perfunctory manner in which arrest, recovery and confession have been dealt with are most disheartening, to say the least,” the court said.
The Nithari case is a classic example of how our criminal justice works. It has been seventeen years of wait for the families who watched with horror when their children went missing, and later, when their skeletal remains were found. If this was not enough of a nightmare for the parents, they now see the main suspects let off the hook.
Who is to blame? The appalling handling of cases like Nithari, as well as of several other murder and rape cases, can be blamed on delayed trials, botched investigations, witnesses turning hostile while the trial drags on, and the lack of evidence and expertise.
In a criminal trial, the accused is considered innocent until proven guilty and the prosecution carries the burden of proving guilt. In such a scenario, we have an acute shortage of forensic experts and psychiatrists who can help law enforcement agencies in collecting and analysing clinching evidence from the crime scene and in strengthening the investigation to withstand legal scrutiny. It is incumbent upon the prosecution to build a water-tight case that can lead to conviction. Victims cannot be made to pay the price for botched investigations.
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