Saket Court acquits four accused of kidnapping, murder and robbery

New Delhi [India], February 17 : Delhi's Saket District Court has acquitted four accused of kidnapping, murder and robbery of Rs. 4.50 Lakh. It was alleged that the deceased was kidnapped from Delhi in a car, strangulated in Noida and his body was dumped in a canal near Khair in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh.
The court acquitted the accused persons, giving them the benefit of the doubt, as the prosecution failed to establish the chain of events beyond reasonable doubt.
An FIR was registered in Police Station Jaitpur in September 2018 on the complaint of Rama Shankar (father of the deceased).
Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Geetanjali acquitted Shivam, Sumit, Heera Lal and Mukeem alias Mukim Khan of the offence under sections 365 (kidnapping), 392 (robbery), 302 (murder), 201 (destruction of evidence), and 120-B (criminal conspiracy), 34 IPC. The court has also acquitted Heera Lal of the offence under section 411 (found in possession of stolen property).
ASJ Geetanjali held, "In view of the aforesaid discussion and the material available on record, I am of the considered view that the prosecution has failed to establish the circumstances in which the accused persons are alleged to have killed the deceased Deepak."
" The testimony of the witnesses examined by the prosecution is insufficient to prove the involvement of the accused persons in the incident," ASJ Geetanjali observed in the judgement of February 12.
While acquitting the accused persons, the court said that in cases based entirely on circumstantial evidence, the court has to satisfy itself that the prosecution proves each circumstance alleged against the accused beyond reasonable doubt and also further proves that each link in the chain of circumstances is equally beyond reasonable doubt.
"However, the prosecution has failed to prove the chain of events in the present case that the accused persons, in furtherance of their common intention, took away deceased Deepak in the Zen car of the accused Mukeem to Noida under the pretext of showing a movie," the court observed in the judgement.
The prosecution has further failed to prove that, as per the plan, the accused persons took the car in the direction of Kalindi Kunj and stopped the vehicle by the side of Mahamaya flyover and
strangulated him with a rope on the way, it added.
"The prosecution has further failed to prove that after murdering Deepak, the accused persons robbed him of his money and thereafter threw his body in the canal near Kasba Kher, District UP. There are so many loose ends in the story of prosecution," the court held.
As per the prosecution, the accused had taken Deepak in the car of accused Mukeem on the pretext of showing a movie and strangulated him on the way with the help of a rope and had thrown his dead body in a canal near Kasba Kher, District Aligarh and had robbed the amount of Rs. 4,50,000 from the deceased and gave his mobile phone to their associate namely Kishan for destruction. Accordingly, charge u/s. 302/392/120-B IPC was added in the FIR.