Delhi Court Acquits Four Men In A Riots Case, Says Their Identification As Rioters Who Committed Loot & Arson Becomes 'Intensely Doubtful'

A Delhi Court has acquitted four men in a case concerning the North East Delhi riots observing the their identification as rioters who committed loot and arson in the complainant's house was intensely doubtful.

Additional Sessions Judge Virender Bhat acquitted Dinesh, Sahil, Sandeep and Tinku who were facing trial under sec. 143, 147, 148, 380, 436 read with sec. 149 of IPC.

FIR 64/2020 was registered at Gokalpuri police on the basis of a written complaint received from the complainant Afzal Saifi wherein he stated that the rioters had looted his house and then set it on fire.

Meanwhile another complaint was lodged by one Shoiab with regards to the theft committed in his shop by the rioters. The said complaint was clubbed with the FIR in the present case.

According to the prosecution case, there were two eye witnesses to the incident of rioting involved who had identified the accused persons participating in the riotous incidents.

One of the eye witnesses stated that he identified 6 to 7 rioters in the CCTV footage, whom he had seen at the spot and that he identified all the four accused persons saying that they were rioters whose faces were not covered at the time of above incident.

In the cross examination, he admitted that the did not make any call to the police station with regards to the rioting incident. He also said that he had not got any DD entry recorded after returning to the police station.

In the statement of the other eye witness, he also identified all the four accused persons to be amongst the rioters who had not covered their faces at the time of incident. His cross­ examination also was identical to that of the first eye witness.

"…the manner in which PW­8 and PW­12 claim to have identified the accused as being amongst the rioters who looted & set on fire the house of PW­1, creates doubt in the mind of Court," the Court said.

Noting that no CCTV footage was placed on record, the Court said that it was difficult to believe that the four accused persons were seen in any video footage and were identified by the two eye witnesses.

"Moreover, even if it is assumed that the accused were seen in such video footage then also it does not advance the prosecution case on the aspect of identity of the accused for the reason that the footage, admittedly, was of some other place and not of the place of incident in this case," the Judge added.

Acquitting the accused persons in the matter, the Court said:

"In view of the nature of evidence lead by the prosecution, as discussed hereinabove, the identification of the accused as rioters who committed loot & arson in the house of PW­1 on 26.02.2020 becomes intensely doubtful. This court feels absolute loath to place any trust upon the testimony of PW­8 & PW­12 on the aspect of identification of the accused as rioters."

Title: State Vs. Dinesh & Ors.

Click Here To Read Order