7-year-old drug case: After High Court rap, five prosecution witnesses appear in Hoshiarpur trial court

Hoshiarpur, October 17

Four days after the Punjab and Haryana High Court rapped officials of the Hoshiarpur police for not appearing as witnesses in a seven-year-old drug smuggling case, five prosecution witnesses appeared in the trial court of Palwinder Jit Kaur, Judge, Special Court, at Hoshiarpur today.

Another witness in the case, an SHO, did not appear even today. There are 10 more witnesses who are yet to be examined. Advocate Pankaj Bedi, counsel for the accused, told The Tribune that three accused were arrested on June 28, 2016, for opening fire at a police party led by SI Gobinder Kumar when their car was stopped.

Pistols and 2 kg smack were recovered from the accused, who were also arrested. The accused include Satinder Singh, alias Kala, of Phalahi, Bhupinder Kumar, alias Monu, of Maruli Brahmna, and Satnam Chaudhary, alias Amna, of Hajipur. Another accused, Deepak Kumar, alias Binny, of Rahimpur in Hoshiarpur (in jail since 2014) was also booked in the case.

The trial was ongoing in the trial court since September 25, 2018. The charges were finalised on September 13, 2019, and prosecution started collecting evidence on October 4, 2019. Even after four years, most of the 21 prosecution witnesses were yet to appear before the court. Only six of them have appeared before the court so far.

Even after repeated orders of the court, prosecution witnesses — most of them police officials — were not appearing before the trial court. ASI Ashok Kumar, ASI Anil Pawar, MHC Harbhajan Singh and LC Rajni Kaur appeared in the court today. Another witness, Kamaljit Singh, the owner of the car recovered from the accused, also appeared.