LUCKNOW: In the Hathras rape-murder case, the Uttar Pradesh government has listed reasons before the Allahabad High Court for not removing the Hathras district magistrate Praveen Kumar Luxkar through an affidavit submitted on November 25.
The proceedings of the hearing were uploaded on the court website late on Wednesday night. According to senior advocate JN Mathur, who is also the amicus curiae in the case, the UP government has claimed that it was not feasible to remove the DM as the issue was politicised.
While making submissions before the two-judge bench, comprising Justices Pankaj Mittal and Rajan Roy, additional advocate general VK Shahi said the state government would not shift the DM as the Opposition had politicised the issue and that there was no case of slackness against him.
The top government counsel also said that since the security of the victim’s family was being looked after by the CRPF and the probe into the case was being conducted by the CBI, the government had no role to play at any level. Therefore, there was no point in removing the DM.
The court posted the matter for December 16. Meanwhile, the CBI has submitted its status report to the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court in a sealed cover. The court on its own had taken cognisance of the case.
The 20-year-old Dalit girl was raped and assaulted allegedly by four youths of Boolgarhi village of Hathras district on September 14.
After battling for life for a fortnight, she succumbed to injuries at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital on September 28.
All the four accused were arrested and sent to jail. Initially, the state government had set up a three-member Special Investigation Team under Principal Secretary, Home, Bhagwan Swaroop, to probe the case, but later recommended a CBI probe on the demand of the victim’s family.
Advocate Shahi also claimed in the court that the CBI had sought more time, till December 10, from the court to complete its investigation into the case.
In a related development, the families of the four accused on Thursday expressed concern about the whereabouts of their sons who were taken to Ahmedabad for a lie detector test. They had undergone Brain Electrical Oscillation Signature Profiling at FSL Gandhinagar on November 25.
Kin of accused concerned
The families of the four accused on Thursday expressed concern about the whereabouts of their sons who were taken to Ahmedabad for a lie detector test.