On Thursday, 7th May, the Bombay High Court dismissed the appeals challenging the acquittal of all 22 accused, including 21 police personnel, in the alleged fake encounter killings of Sohrabuddin Shaikh, his wife Kauser Bi, and their associate Tulsiram Prajapati.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad upheld the earlier trial court judgment and rejected the appeals filed by Sohrabuddin Shaikh’s brothers, Rubabuddin and Nayabuddin.
The appeals had asked the High Court either to cancel the acquittal order passed by the trial court or to order a fresh trial under Section 386(a) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The brothers approached the court as victims who had lost close family members in the case.
Appeals pending since 2019
The matter had been pending before the High Court since 2019. After several hearings, the court reserved its order earlier this year and finally delivered the verdict on Thursday.
During the hearings, the petitioners argued that the original trial was not conducted properly and that serious mistakes were made while examining the evidence. According to them, the trial court relied on assumptions and failed to properly appreciate important facts related to the case.
One of the major concerns raised by the petitioners was that the prosecution did not call magistrates before whom several key witnesses had earlier recorded their statements. Many of these witnesses later turned hostile during the trial, which weakened the prosecution’s case.
Rubabuddin Shaikh had written letters to the Ministry of Home Affairs, CBI Director, and Cabinet Secretary before approaching the High Court to seek assistance from the government to challenge the decision of the trial court.
However, during the High Court proceedings, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) informed the High Court that they had accepted the verdict given by the trial court in 2018, and hence they would not be challenging the decision in court.
Trial Court had acquitted all the accused
The special CBI court in Mumbai had acquitted all 22 accused on 21st December, 2018. The accused included serving and retired police officers from Gujarat, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.
The trial court ruled that the prosecution had failed to show any convincing proof of the charge levelled against the accused persons regarding conspiracy, abduction, and murder. In the entire trial period, about 210 witnesses gave statements. But around 92 witnesses turned hostile, which affected the prosecution’s case.
In its detailed 358-page judgment, the trial court had expressed sympathy for the victims’ families but stated that there was not enough strong and reliable evidence to convict the accused. The court had also said that people cannot be convicted only on the basis of suspicion or moral belief.
Background of the case
The case dates back to 23rd November, 2005, when Sohrabuddin Anwarhussain Shaikh, Kauser Bi and Tulsiram Prajapati were abducted from a luxury bus travelling from Hyderabad to Sangli.
According to the CBI, Shaikh, a notorious gangster, his wife Kausar Bi and his aide Tulsiram Prajapati were abducted by Gujarat police from a bus when they were on their way from Hyderabad to Sangli in Maharashtra on the intervening night of November 22 and 23, 2005.
Shaikh was killed in an alleged fake encounter on 26th November, 2005, near Ahmedabad, while the CBI claims his wife, Kauser Bi, was killed three days later and her body was disposed of. A year later, on December 27, 2006, Prajapati was also shot dead by Gujarat and Rajasthan police in an alleged fake encounter near Chapri on the Gujarat-Rajasthan border.
The case was initially probed by the Gujarat CID before the CBI took over in 2010. In 2013, the Supreme Court directed that the trial be shifted to Mumbai from Gujarat on the central agency’s request to ensure a fair trial.
