MADURAI: The CBI reiterated that the father-son duo Jeyaraj and Beniks, who allegedly died due to custodial torture at the hands of the Sathankulam police, had been arrested in a false case.
Opposing the bail petition filed by the then Station House Officer (SHO) of Sathankulam police station S Sridhar, the Special Public Prosecutor appearing on behalf of the CBI told the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court that the accused policemen had registered a false case against the deceased in order to take them into custody.
Though the counsel appearing for Sridhar claimed that the SHO was on patrol and had no role to play in registering the complaint against the deceased or the police torture, the Special PP contended that the petitioner being an SHO cannot claim so. He also added that the deceased were taken into custody in the SHO’s vehicle and that they were tortured in his presence.
Another counsel appearing for Jeyaraj’s wife Selvarani, who has filed an intervening application in the case, argued that the complicity of all accused including Sridhar cannot be ignored as false records had been created for arresting the deceased.
Justice V Bharathidasan, who heard the submissions, directed the Special PP to instruct the CBI officers to produce the case diary before the court on Friday and reserved an order on the petition.
Similar submissions had been made by CBI investigating officer VK Shukla in the previous hearing on August 25. He said that the deceased had been arrested in a false case. He also added that the agency was likely to register a separate case against the accused cops over the false complaint registered by them against the deceased, when the judge posed a question in that regard.