Badlapur school sexual assaults: HC raps state CID for taking Akshay Shinde encounter probe lightly

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Monday admonished Maharashtra’s Crime Investigation Department (CID) for allegedly taking the investigation into the encounter killing of the main accused in the Badlapur school sexual assaults case lightly.
Stressing the need for a free and fair investigation, a division bench of justices Revati Mohite Dere and Prithviraj Chavan said the CID’s conduct so far raises doubts about whether it is trying to withhold information from the judicial magistrate conducting an inquiry into the extrajudicial killing.
The accused, 24-year-old Akshay Shinde, was arrested in August for allegedly sexually assaulting two kindergarten girls at a school in Badlapur East where he worked as a cleaner. He was killed by the police in September in what they said was “retaliatory firing”.
On Monday, the court noticed lapses regarding the investigation into the thigh wound sustained by assistant police inspector Nilesh More, who was allegedly shot by Shinde, which was the incident that triggered the extrajudicial killing.
The court questioned the police’s decision to shift More from a government hospital to a private hospital against medical advice. When it was told the police took the decision keeping More’s interests in mind, the court said, “This should come from the family, not from the police department.”
The bench also questioned the veracity of More’s discharge papers, noting that they were written in Hindi despite the doctor and More both being Marathi. It expressed disappointment after learning that the police had failed to record the statement of the doctor who discharged More against medical advice. It also questioned the different opinions given by doctors in public and private hospitals.
“The government hospital had said that More’s thigh had an entry wound and an exit wound, that the shot went through the thigh, and now this private hospital says it’s a grazing wound. How are we supposed to reconcile?” the judges said.
The bench also gave the state CID an earful after they were told by Dr Birendra Saraf, the advocate general of Maharashtra, that certain material documents in the investigation, including an X-ray, had not yet been handed over to the judicial magistrate.
“This is a matter of custodial death. How can the state CID take this lightly? How can you keep it so vague? You are creating doubt in the investigation. Are you trying to withhold information from the magistrate? Does the magistrate not require these documents in order to determine whether the death is a genuine encounter or not?” the court said, adding that it would take Superintendent of Police Prashant Waghunde to task. “We want to ensure that the investigation is free and fair,” the court said.
Adjourning the matter to January, the court directed the state CID to take the statement of the doctor who discharged More from the government hospital, verify whose writing it was on the discharge papers, and make sure More’s X-ray scan was collected and sent to the magistrate conducting the enquiry.
Akshay Shinde, 24, was shot dead by the Thane police crime branch on September 23 in “retaliatory firing” when he was being taken from Taloja jail to Thane in a police van for questioning. The police claimed that Shinde snatched the gun of one of the four armed police personnel seated next to him in the van. In the ensuing scuffle, the gun allegedly got loaded, and a bullet was fired, which hit API More on his thigh. Shinde then allegedly fired two more rounds at the other officers, but missed. Then, senior police inspector Sanjay Shinde took out his service weapon and fired a round at Akshay Shinde “in self-defence”, which killed him instantly, according to his statement.
Akshay Shinde’s father, Anna Shinde, has termed the police encounter fake and claimed his son was killed for political reasons. In his petition, Anna Shinde sought a court-monitored probe by a special investigation team (SIT) into the encounter killing.