TIRUNELVELI: Delay by the Tamil Nadu government in granting sanction for the prosecution of ASP Balveer Singh is hampering the filing of charge sheet by the CB-CID against the suspended officer in custodial torture cases, sources said.
A CB-CID team probing the case has not arrested Singh and other police personnel accused of removing the teeth of suspects in Ambasamudram, Kallidaikurichi and VK Puthur police stations even 125 days after the first incident of torture was recorded on March 10.
Based on the complaint of Arunkumar, one of the victims, police had registered first case against Singh and his team on May 1 under Sections 323, 324, 326, 506 (1) of IPC, 3 (1) (e), 3 (2) (v), 3 (2) (va) of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and Section 75 of The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act.
A few more cases were later registered based on complaints from other victims. “Even as they were conducting inquiry with the victims and the accused, the CB-CID sleuths sent a request to the state government demanding nod for prosecuting the accused. The charge sheet is almost ready,” sources said.
When contacted by The New Indian Express, the Executive Director of the People’s Watch Henry Tiphagne said that he would soon file a 'direction petition' before the High Court demanding the filing of the charge-sheet by CB-CID. “As the Sections of SC/ST (POA) Act were invoked against the accused police personnel, the CB-CID sleuths should have filed the charge-sheet within 60 days.
However, they have not done so even 73 days after the registration of the case on Arunkumar’s complaint. We suspect that the CB-CID sleuths are intentionally delaying filing of charge-sheet against Singh. The State government has not even disbursed the compensation to the victims under SC/ST (POA) Act,” he added. Tiphagne further said that the State government was keeping confidential the inquiry reports of the Cheranmahadevi Sub-Divisional Magistrate Mohammed Shabbir Alam and senior IAS officer P Amudha.