New Delhi, April 19
A day after the Delhi High Court had granted bail to Jessica Lall murder case prime accused Manu Sharma and six other co-accused, it today issued direction to the Delhi police to place before it complete case diary, the most vital document in any criminal case while hearing a suo motu petition on alleged botching of investigation.
A direction to this effect was issued to Delhi police standing counsel Ms Mukta Gupta by a Bench, headed by acting Chief Justice Vijender Jain, who had taken suo motu action for registering a petition in the matter earlier after the acquittal had invoked tremendous public outcry on acquittal of all accused by the trial judge and reports surfacing in media about alleged shoddy investigation and tampering of evidence.
The order for production of case diary was issued by the court after perusing certain documents submitted by the police counsel in sealed cover, which included the disclosure statements of Manu Sharma and other accused in CD form, recorded by the police after they were arrested in May 1999, few days after the murder.
Since the suo motu petition was registered by the court on February 24, it did not approve the long time taken by the police to submit required documents and expressed its displeasure over the delay.
The police counsel, however, submitted that the disclosure statements of the accused contained in a CD, were not considered by the trial court. Since the disclosure statements of accused given to the police during custody had not much evidence value unless corroborated by any other independent material, the prosecution had not much relied upon those.
In view of this, the court sought the entire case diary and posted further hearing of the suo motu petition for May 8.
The hearing in the suo motu petition was independent of the police appeal in the case, filed after tremendous public pressure, which was heard yesterday by another division Bench, which granted bail to Manu and six other co-accused.
In the suo motu petition, the court would examine whether police had probed the case in right earnest, whether reports appearing in media about alleged botching of investigation was correct, specially about replacing of an empty cartridge in the Central Forensic Laboratory and the role of Chief Investigating Officer and some senior police officers.
