Sources on Wednesday told The Daily Guardian that the Justice Chauhan Commission set up by the Supreme Court to investigate the encounter of notorious gangster Vikas Dubey and his operatives has not found any testimony against the police theory, so far. Sources added that none of the eyewitnesses have refuted the police statement in their testimony.
The panel consists of former judge B.S. Chauhan, former Allahabad High Court Justice S.K. Aggarwal and former UP DGP K.L. Gupta. The apex court had ordered this commission to submit its report within two months. The panel visited the encounter site and spoke to people in search of eyewitnesses.
According to sources, even Dubey’s relatives did not come to record their statement before the panel. Most of those who recorded the statement are police eyewitnesses who gave details of the incident before the encounter.
On 22 July, the top court approved appointment of three-member commission, headed by Justice Chauhan to investigate the Vikas Dubey encounter case.
Seeking a report from the commission within two months, the top court asked, “Why Dubey was out on bail or parole despite so many criminal cases against him is the single-most important factor of the entire matter.”
The UP government had been asked not to resort to any further encounters to eliminate dreaded gangsters in the state.
About monitoring the case, the CJI had clarified that the apex court will not monitor the investigations into Dubey’s encounter. “Just because it has received so much publicity, we can’t start monitoring criminal investigations,” observed the CJI.
The top court was hearing a batch of petitions questioning the encounter killing of Vikas Dubey and his aides by Uttar Pradesh Police after eight of their colleagues were killed by gangsters on 3 July.
The first petition was filed by a Maharashtra-based lawyer Ghanshyam Upadhyay, hours before Dubey was shot dead on 10 July. UP Police had claimed that Dubey tried to jump custody after a vehicle in the convoy bringing him to Kanpur turned turtle.
Another petition by Anoop Prakash Awasthi had raised a question: “Shall we close our honourable courts, prosecution agencies and dismantle the system of administration of criminal justice as the trigger-happy cops in Uttar Pradesh do not need them and believe only upon their fire power when taking any adversary or outlaw in their custody?”