In a recent ruling, Delhi’s Karkardooma Court reprimanded the Delhi Police for clubbing six FIRs in a 2020 anti-Hindu Delhi Riots case and noted that the Investigating Officer (IO) “shrugged off” his duty to conduct a thorough investigation into the 6 FIRs. The court found that the 7-second video, based on which the IO falsely implicated a Hindu man Sandeep Bhati was manipulated.

Acquitting the Hindu man on the 8^th of January 2025, Additional Sessions Judge Pulastya Pramachala referred the case to the Commissioner of Police and directed him to assess the concerned IO’s conduct and take suitable steps.

The case against Sandeep Bhati was registered at the Karawal Nagar Police Station based on the statement given by a person named Shahrukh who was injured in the Delhi riots on 24^th February 2020.

In his statement, Shahrukh said that on 24^th February 2020, at around 4:15 pm, he was returning from his maternal grandmother’s home in an auto-rickshaw and “when he reached near Shiv Vihar Tiraha, a riotous mob dragged him out of the auto, started beating him with sticks and stones, and thereafter somebody fired upon him as a result of which he received gunshot injuries upon his left leg and chest. He further stated that he became unconscious and when he gained consciousness, he found himself in GTB Hospital.”

The 6 complaints alleged loot and arson but none named Sandeep Bhati – they were not even there to witness who committed arson

The prosecution told the court that during the investigation of this case of the Delhi Riots, the site plan of where the incident described by Shahrukh unfolded, was prepared by the IO. As per this site plan, the place of incident was at Shiv Vihar Tiraha on Main Road, Karawal Nagar, which was going towards Joharipurfrom Karawal Nagar Chowk, via Shiv Vihar Tiraha. There was a Hanuman Temple beside the place of the incident.

While the investigation into this matter was underway, 8 other written complaints were received by the police. These 8 complaints were clubbed for investigation with the present FIR. However, one of the complainants Arif Ahmad withdrew his complaint saying that his father had filed a similar complaint. Later, it was found that the incident reported in the complaint filed by one Mohammad Khalid transpired on 25^th February 2020 and thus a separate investigation report was to be filed. Thus, out of 8 only the remaining 6 complaints of complainants namely Mohammad Haneef, Sayba, Ashma, Gulab Singh, Mohammad Rahish and Sahab Jadi, were prosecuted in the present case, on the grounds of the proximity of date, time and place of the incident, the prosecution said.

In his complaint, Mohammad Haneef alleged that his Paan shop near Hanuman Mandir, Shiv Vihar Tiraha was not found two days after he returned to the place after having fled the spot on 24^th February 2020 after the riots began.

In her complaint, Sayba alleged that her father had a fruit cart (thela) and on 24^th February 2020, when the riots began, she along with her family left the place while leaving the fruit Thela there. However, when she returned to her house later she found the Thela in a damaged condition and two days later sold the cart.

Another complainant named Ashma who was a vegetable vendor alleged that on 24^th February 2020, when the riots erupted in her area, she along with her family left her house. Ashma claimed that when she along with her family returned on 18^th March 2020, she found her house ransacked and Rs 20000 cash and gold jewellery and 250 gm silver jewellery were looted from her home.

Similarly, Gulab Singh alleged in his complaint that on 24^th February 2020, when the riots began he and his family left the locality only to return on 13^th March 2020. Gulab Singh found that hat the lock of the gate of his house was broken and the lock of the iron box was also broken and his jewellery worth Rs 2 lakh and cash of Rs 95 thousand had been looted.

In the complaint, Mohammad Rahish claimed that on 24th February 2020, when the riots broke out, he and his family left the locality and returned home on 16th March 2020. Rahish alleged that he found that his motorcycle make and model Passion Pro, which was standing in a plot beside his house, had been damaged by the rioters. He further stated that after two days he got the said motorcycle repaired.

Meanwhile, complainant Sahab Jadi alleged that she also left her house along with the family for her ancestral village in Badaun and returned to her house in Delhi on 1^st March 2020. She claimed to have found that her house had been ransacked and articles of her house had been damaged and burnt. She further alleged that cash amount of Rs.1,00,000/-, jewellery worth rupees one lakh and other household articles were found stolen.

It must be noted here that all of the six complainants and their family members had left the riot-hit area on 24^th February 2020 and none of them actually saw who allegedly damaged their properties or looted their belongings. None of the complainants even named Sandeep Bhati.

Video presented by injured ‘victim’ Shahrukh’s brother led to the false implication of Sandeep Bhati in Delhi Riots

While the investigation into the six FIRs was ongoing and the statements of the complainants were recorded by the Investigation Officer, on 20^th November 2020, Sameer Khan, the brother of injured Shahrukh produced one CD containing two video clips to the IO, showing his brother being dragged by the mob and he identified the accused Sandeep Bhati in the said video-clip. Following this, Bhati was arrested on 23^rd December 2020.

After Bhati’s arrest, the police analysed the accused person’s call data records and it was found that on the day of the incident i.e. 24.02.2020 from 16:17:39 hrs to 16:42:29 hrs the location of his mobile number was near Rajdhani Public School, A-1, Babu Nagar, Shiv Vihar, Delhi. This Rajdhani Public School was just adjacent to the Shiv Vihar Tiraha, where the injured Shahrukh was found in an unconscious condition.

During his testimony, Sameer Khan identified his brother Shahrukh and accused Sandeep Bhati in the video file with time duration of 7 seconds. In another video file with a duration of 15 seconds, Sameer Khan identified a person being dragged by another group of persons, as his brother Shahrukh.

On the basis of the statements of the complainants of clubbed complaints, sections 427/436/380/454 IPC were added in the present case. On the basis of the supplementary statement of injured/victim Shahrukh, Section-392/394 IPC was also added in the present case as his mobile phone i.e. iPhone 6 was also looted by the rioters.

On 24^th March 2021, a charge sheet was filed against accused Sandeep Bhati under sections 147/148/149/188/307/380/392/394/427/436/454 IPC. Later, in 2021, charges were framed against Bhati, to which he pleaded not guilty and demanded a trial.

Sandeep Bhati was charged with an attempt to murder with the prosecution building its case against Bhati solely based on a video which they claimed showed Bhati participating in the assault.

“That in the evening of 24.02.2020, in the area at or around Shiv Vihar Tiraha, main Karawal Nagar, Delhi-110094, within the jurisdiction of PS Karawal Nagar, you being from a particular community alongwith your other associates (unidentified) formed an unlawful assembly, the object whereof was to cause maximum damage to the property and persons, including committing murder, commit criminal trespass, vandalism, robbery and arson in the shops, houses and other properties of the persons residing in the said area, damage their vehicles, use force, violence and firearms inprosecution of the common object of such assembly and thereby committed offences punishable under Section(s) 143/147/148 IPC read with Section 149 IPC and within my cognizance,” the charges framed against Bhati read.

The Investigating Officer also alleged that “on the aforesaid date and place, between 4.00 PM to 6.00 PM, you [Sandeep Bhati] being member of said unlawful assembly in furtherance of your common object alongwith your other associates (unidentified) caused gunshot injuries upon the person of Shahrukh, S/o Shri Yakub Khan, aged about 25 years, merely on account of the fact that he belonged to the other community and with such intention knowledge that had his death been caused, you would have been guilty of murder and thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 307 IPC read with Section 149 IPC within my cognizance.”

Similarly, charges in the context of the rest of the complaints were also framed against Bhati.

Sandeep Bhati’s defence: How the man who stopped others from assaulting Shahrukh during Delhi Riots was falsely accused of the same by the victim’s brother and the police

Sandeep Bhati refuted the allegations levelled against him and contended that the witnesses falsely deposed against him and that he had been falsely implicated in the Delhi Riots case. Bhati’s counsel Shailendra Singh argued that the Investigating Officer (IO) could not ascertain the place of crime and that he did not find the source of the video based on which, Bhati was arrested.

IO used two photographs of the accused for the Face Recognition examination, but he did not obtain a certificate under Section 65-B of the Indian Evidence Act, in respect of those photographs, Bhati’s counsel told the court.

Further, Singh pointed out that the video which was Sameer Khan claimed to have seen on television and the prosecution produced before the court was incomplete and that the video clip produced by the defence was an extended version of the same video. The defence highlighted that the IO has also admitted that the video clip produced by the defence was indeed an extended version of the video produced by him.

The prosecution witness number 07 Ct. Ravi said that victim Shahrukh was lifted from Shiv Vihar. The longer video produced by the defence shows that accused Sandeep Bhati was not carrying any weapon of offence, rather he was stopping others from assaulting the victim. The defence further contended that due to large gatherings, it was not possible for Bhati to take the victim to the hospital or call the police.

Moreover, the defence emphasised that Sandeep Bhati’s aggression as seen in the video was to protect the victim and not to assault him. In addition, the video clip produced by the prosecution does not show the accused assaulting victim Shahrukh.  

In response to this, the prosecution could only give the argument that since Sandeep Bhati was present at the crime scene and he alone could be identified in the video, he was prosecuted. The prosecution presented 21 witnesses during the trial.

Rajdhani School in the Shiv Vihar Tiraha area was the centre of Islamist mob attacks on Hindus during Delhi Riots

Notably, the Shiv Vihar Tiraha area where the incident of assault against Shahrukh and alleged incidents of vandalism and loot as claimed in the 6 FIRs happened, was near the Rajdhani School owned by one Faizal Farooqui where Hindus were brutally attacked by the Islamist mobs. On the afternoon of 24th February, the first body that was found was that of Dilbar Negi. His hands and legs were chopped off, and the rest of him was burnt right in front of Rajdhani school in Anil Sweets.

OpIndia reported how the Rajdhani School was turned into an attack base by the Islamists to target Hindus. The Delhi Police’s chargesheet in the riots case, mentions the testimony of the guard of DRP School which is adjacent to the Faizal Farooqui-owned Rajdhani School. The guard testified that in the afternoon of 24th of February when he went to close the gates of DRP school, he saw that several Muslims were standing at the gate of Rajdhani school and the owner, Faizal Farooqui was also present with them. Faizal, who was sitting on his bike, asked the guard of Rajdhani school (a Hindu whose identity we are withholding) to give access to “all his Muslim brothers” into the school and also said, “Aaj dekh lenge Hinduon ko”.

In Shiv Vihar Tiraha, one of those most sinister plans hatched was executed from the rooftop of Rajdhani School. Islamist mobs fired guns, and threw bottles full of acid, stones etc from the rooftop of Rajdhani school. The first chargesheet filed in the Delhi Anti-Hindu riots case also pertained to the Rajdhani school and the events that transpired there on the 24^th and the 25^th of February 2020. It was in this Shiv Vihar Tiraha area that on the 24^th of February, the totally burnt body of Dilbar Negi was recovered. On the 24^th at 4 PM, Rahul Solanki sustained gunshot injury. On the 25^th, acid was thrown as SSB Jawans. On the 25^th at around 4:30 PM, Veer Bhan sustained gunshot injury on his head while crossing the Taraha on his bike. On the 25^th at around 5:00 PM, Dinesh sustained gunshot injury on his head while standing at the Taraha. On the 25^th of February at around 10:15 PM, Alok sustained injuries from stone pelting by Muslims.

Given the one after the other brutal attacks on Hindus by Islamist mobs in the Shiv Vihar Tiraha area, the local Hindus were enraged and thus a crowd of Hindus also gathered in the area.

Observations made by the court while acquitting Sandeep Bhati

The court found conspicuous lapses in the investigation and observed that while allegations of unlawful assembly and rioting as levelled by Shahrukh were “well established”, the IO clubbed 8 more complaints and later decided to prosecute 6 complaints with the present case. The court noted that the stand of the prosecution and Investigating Officer relied on the presumption that the same mob may have been involved in all the incidents described by the 6 complainants in their respective cases.

Moreover, the court observed that instead of investigating each of the six complaints, the IO only recorded statements under CrPC 161 and prepared site plan for three complaints. In fact, it was only during the cross-examination that the IO admitted the signature on the three site plans. The court found that other than this, no investigation was conducted into the six complaints. The extent of the IO’s negligence was such that the officer did not even care to confirm the date and time of the incidents described in the six complaints or find out the source of the information based on which the complainants filed their complaints since all of them had left the riot-hit area on 24^th February 2020 and none of them witnessed the crimes or saw Sandeep Bhati carrying out any illegal activity.

“Such stand of IO and prosecution, however, remained based on presumption that same mob would have been involved in those six incidents as well. Record shows that in the name of investigation on those six complaints, IO only recorded statement under Section 161 Cr.P.C. and prepared site plan for three complainants. IO even did not remember about preparing three site plans and it was only during cross examination by defence that IO admitted his signature on these three site plans. Apart from aforesaid steps, nothing more was done to investigate into other six complaints. IO even did not confirm as to when did these six incidents had actually taken place. It was well known to IO that none of these six complainants had seen their respective incident. Thus, they mentioned the date of incident in their respective complaints, only on the basis of some other source. IO did not bother to find out source of their information or any witness to such incidents, if taken place as reported by these six complainants,” the court said adding that no photographs were taken or obtained in respect of property of complainants Ashma, Gulab Singh and Sahab Jadi, which was otherwise being done in a routine manner in such cases.

Justice Pulastya Pramachala observed that the IO “shrugged off” his duty to conduct an investigation into each of the six complaints and file a report accordingly adding that this is the reason why the exact time of such incidents is not mentioned in the charges.

“Thus, it is well apparent, that IO literally shrugged off his duty to properly investigate all these complaints and to submit his report based on complete investigation. That is the reason that in the charges exact time of such incidents were not mentioned. There is no concrete evidence on the record of this case, except testimonies of these complainants, to establish the alleged incidents and reasons thereof,” the court noted.

Calling the IO’s conduct of clubbing the six complaints with the present case pertaining to Sandeep Bhati’s alleged role in assault against Shahrukh, “illegal and unprofessional”, the court observed that the clubbing of the six complaints without proper investigation was an injustice to the six complainants.

Regarding the present case against Sandeep Bhati over his alleged involvement in the attack on Shahrukh, the court said that the prosecution only produced two videos to back their allegation. Of these two videos, the accused was identified only in one 7-second video. However, a longer (12-second) version of the same video produced by the defence featured both the victim Shahrukh and the accused Sandeep Bhati, however, in the video, Bhati was not seen assaulting the Muslim youth. In fact, the accused was seen stopping the others from attacking Shahrukh.

“But, video D-1 shows further part of video Ex.PW16/V-1 for another 5 seconds. In this video accused is seen stopping the others from assaulting the victim. Ld. prosecutor took an objection that this video was not forensically examined, hence cannot be looked into. However, that objection cannot be a reason not to compare this video with some photographs proved by prosecution itself as Ex.PW16/P-1 to P-13,” the court said.

According to the testimony of prosecution witness Sameer (Shahrukh’s brother), he turned over 18 images to the IO, claiming to be screenshots from the video. However, the court concluded that these photographs were taken from the omitted five-second portion rather than the video submitted by the prosecution. The court found that the photographs showed those involved in violence, however, instead of tracing and prosecuting them, the IO falsely implicated the accused Sandeep Bhati.

“This goes on to show that PW16 and IO did have video D-1 with them. IO did not use that longer video, rather he cut short that video for 5 seconds, to omit the portion showing role of accused as stopping others from assaulting the victim. Photograph Ex.PW16/P-7 and P-8 showed the persons, who were part of assaulting group. But, IO instead of tracing and prosecuting those actual culprits, framed accused herein for assault on the victim. The abovementioned suggestion of defence as given to IO, thus, appears to be a possible scenario,” the court observed.

Further pointing out the investigation lapses on the part of the IO, the court said, “He did not try to find source of this video at all. Thus, it remains without any doubt that IO did not investigate this case properly and accused herein was falsely implicated in this case on the basis of video Ex.PW16/V-1. As already observed herein above, apart from this video, prosecution did not come up with any other evidence against accused.”

Considering the arguments of the defence and prosecution and observations and findings that emerged,  Justice Pulastya Pramachala acquitted accused Sandeep Bhati of all charges brought forth against him. The Delhi court also referred the matter to the Commissioner of Police to assess the conduct of the IO in the context of the present case and take requisite steps. Moreover, the court ordered a separate investigation into the six complaints and a final report be filed in those cases.

The conviction of Dinesh Yadav on charges of rioting during the 2020 anti-Hindu Delhi Riots and the dramatic acquittal

In May 2023, a Delhi court acquitted Dinesh Yadav alias Michael, Sandeep alias Mogli and Tinku of the charges of rioting during the anti-Hindu Delhi Riots of 2020. While observing that the possibility cannot become evidence, the court said that there was insufficient proof against the three. The three were accused of rioting, being members of a riotous mob that vandalised two properties and looted certain articles. Based on the complaint of Aakil Saifi and Irfan, FIR 124 was filed against the three at Gokalpuri Police Station. Charges were framed against them under Sections 147, 148, 149, 380, 188, 427 and 436 of Indian Penal Code, 1860.

Back then, Justice Pulastya Pramachala observed that the victims, who were also the witnesses, were not present at the concerned places when the incident happened during the Delhi Riots. Thus, their statements regarding the incident were based on hearsay only. It was found that the special public prosecutor ‘led’ the witness to the identification of the accused during his cross-examination. It must be recalled that in January 2022, Dinesh Yadav was the first to be convicted in the 2020 Delhi Riots case and was sentenced to five years in jail over the accusation of setting ablaze the house of a 73-year-old Muslim woman and taking away her buffalo and calf.

OpIndia had reported how the conviction of Dinesh Yadav in Delhi Riots was based solely on his religious identity – that is – him being a Hindu and how the sections under which he was convicted had been interpreted differently to convict Dinesh Yadav and on the other hand, give bail to Muslim accused in the Dilbar Negi case. Those reports can be read here and here.