THE chargesheet drawn up by Judge T.K. Ghosh, additional district and sessions judge, Alipore, cited a Supreme Court precedent in favouring a trial of the five Punjab commandos. Excerpts from the chargesheet:
"The dead bodies of Basir Ahmed and his wife Sakina could not be traced during investigation. The investigating officer has submitted a chargesheet against all the five accused under Section 120B (read with Sections 302/201/34 IPC). The accused persons were arrested on October 17, 1995, but they were released on anticipatory bail granted by the learned sessions judge, Alipore.
It is contended by the learned advocate appearing for the CBI that although the dead bodies of the victims could not be recovered or traced during investigations, the circumstantial evidences collected by the CBI clearly showed that the accused persons under the leadership of principal accused Sant Singh, then SP, Operations, had raided the house of these victims and committed their murder by indiscriminate firing from sophisticated weapons on May 17, 1993 between 4.30 and 5.15 a.m.
It is further contended by the prosecution that investigation has revealed that all the accused persons under the leadership of accused Sant Singh had obtained firearms from the Punjab police prior to commission of this offence. That apart, ballistic report shows that the recovered fired cartridges were used by these firearms which were issued in the name of accused Sant Singh and others.
It is true that there is no direct evidence to the allegation of murder of the victims as the dead bodies could not be recovered as yet. But I must say, circumstantial evidences which have been collected by the prosecution go to show that the victims were killed by the accused assailants by indiscriminate firing in the early morning of May 17, 1993."
