SIT reconstituted to crack Gurkirat murder case

PK Jaiswar

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, July 10

The blind murder of nine-year-old Gurkirat Singh, a resident of Verka, still remains a mystery as the police has not reached anywhere in its investigations even after the narco tests of three suspects.

Meanwhile, the Punjab Police have reconstituted the special investigating team (SIT) to probe almost the three-year-old brutal murder. The new SIT would be headed by a Deputy Commissioner of Police.

Gurkirat went missing from outside his house in November 2012 and later his body was found dumped at a secluded place a few metres away from his house.

Angrej Singh, the father of the deceased, had filed a petition before the high court, urging it to hand over the case to the CBI. Due to an inordinate delay in the investigations, the court had asked the city police to consider handing over the probe to the investigating agency.

The Police Commissioner constituted a special investigating team (SIT) to crack the mysterious killing of Gurkirat. The SIT zeroed in on three suspects, including relatives of the deceased. They were identified as Jagwant Singh, Harpal Singh and Jaspal Singh, residents of the same village. Out of the three, two suspects — Harpal and Jaspal — had undergone polygraph tests at the Forensic Science Laboratory at Madhuban (Haryana) while the third accused failed to complete the test at that time. His narco test was conducted after a few months at the Forensic Science laboratory at Gujarat. The reports of all three suspects had been received but the police failed to reach any conclusion.

At present, the Additional Director-General of Police (ADGP) (Crime) is personally monitoring the case and has reconstituted the SIT which would now be headed by a Deputy Commissioner of Police, said Gaurav Garg, ACP (East), who was part of the SIT which was formed by the city police. Garg said the police would be filing its reply in the form of an affidavit in the high court on July 14.

“Though the report was inconclusive, it has provided further leads which should be investigated further. Now the reconstituted SIT would probe the matter further,” said Garg.