Srinagar: A court here on Friday directed the Crime Branch to register an FIR against the police and investigate the alleged custodial death of a youth in the Natipora area of the city.
The directions of the judicial magistrate, first class, Srinagar, came after hearing a petition of Shafiqa, the mother of 21-year-old Muslim Muneer who died last week after being called to a police station in a theft case.
“SHO PS Crime Branch is directed to get an FIR registered in the case against the accused No. 2 Abdul Rashid (working as Munshi in police) and other unknown police official/s of PS Nowgam under the relevant sections of IPC,” the court said in its order.
It also asked the Crime Branch to get the case investigated by an “efficient police officer to bring the culprit/s to book”.
Over the family’s prayer of a direction to conduct test identification parades (TIP) in the case and for collecting the CCTV footage of police station Nowgam, the court said it will not pass any direction “as it is the domain of the investigating agency and the court cannot interfere in the same”.
The family has accused the police of the custodial killing of Muneer.
Police said Muneer was called to the police station on July 09 forenoon for allegedly being involved in a theft case.
“As the person seemed to be under the influence of drugs at the time of reporting at the Nowgam police station for examination in the case, his family was called who also confirmed that the person uses drugs habitually,” the police had said in a statement.
Considering these facts, within a couple of hours on the afternoon of the same day, Muneer was handed over to his family members with all legal formalities, they said.
“Later, it came to fore that he died in the evening at around 5 pm,” they added.
Police have also ordered a formal inquiry into the matter and an official of the Nowgam police station, who the family members and relatives suspected of foul play, was placed under suspension for a “fair and transparent inquiry”. (With PTI inputs)
