The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the judicial probe earlier ordered by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in connection with the death of a 22-year-old protesting farmer Shubhkaran Singh during the agitation of farmers at the Punjab-Haryana border.
"We don't find any merit in the appeal of Haryana Govt. We dismiss the same," a bench of the top court, headed by Justice Surya Kant and also comprising Justice KV Viswanathan, said in its order today and rejected the Special Leave Petition (SLP) filed by the Haryana government.
The top court rejected the arguments of the Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta, representing the Haryana government, saying that the Police will be demoralised by such an order for a judicial probe.
The top court, however, posted the matter for further hearing to April 19. The Haryana government had filed the special leave petition in the apex court on March 11 against the High Court’s decision.
The Haryana government moved the Supreme Court last month and filed an SLP challenging the Punjab and High Court's order to set up a judicial inquiry panel into the alleged death of the protesting farmer.
Singh, 21, a native of Bhatinda, died on February 21 on the Punjab-Haryana border, at Khanauri, while during a violent clash between the protesting farmers and the State police personnel.
He was unfortunately got caught in the violent clash and subsequently died, when some protesting farmers were allegedly trying to move towards the barricades and broke it and they were stopped by security personnel from crossing the state border and marching to Delhi.
The SLP was filed by the Haryana govt on March 11, as per the case details available on the Supreme Court's website.
The Punjab & Haryana HC's Acting Chief Justice GS Sandhawalia and Justice Lapita Banerji had passed the order directing setting up a three-member judicial inquiry panel headed by retired HC judge Jaishree Thakur to probe into the various aspects of the case.
It had in its order said that the probe could not be entrusted solely either to the Punjab or to Haryana for “reasons obvious as both states have several things to cover up”.
The three-member committee also comprised two officers namely; Parmod Ban, ADGP (Additional Director General, Police) Punjab, and Amitabh Singh Dhillon, ADGP, Haryana, besides the retd HC Judge, Justice Thakur, the HC said, in its order.
The SLP, filed by the Haryana govt, sought the issuance of directions to the Centre and State to place on record before the SC the complete data on the particular area concerning tear gas shells, pellet guns etc, and to ascertain and find out "whether the force used by the police forces on their own countrymen is reasonable, indiscriminate and inhuman. Under what circumstances, those sad situations arose, the plea said.
