The Rajasthan High Court has acquitted all 11 accused in the 2019 Sikar double murder case, setting aside the trial court's convictions and sentences, including a death sentence, after holding that the prosecution failed to prove an unbroken chain of circumstantial evidence against them.
Source: The Times of India (Jaipur News)
A division bench of Justice Mahendar Kumar Goyal and Justice Bhuwan Goyal pronounced the judgment on October 30 while deciding a death reference and connected appeals arising from the November 30, 2024 judgment of Additional Sessions Judge No. 1, Sikar. The trial court had awarded capital punishment to one convict, life imprisonment to nine others, and convicted one person for destruction of evidence.
Source: Pink City Post
Why the CCTV evidence collapsed
The case arose from the deaths of Ganpat Lal and Prem, who were found dead in October 2019. According to the prosecution case, Ganpat Lal was summoned to a petrol pump on the Palsana bypass around 11.16 pm on October 21, 2019, allegedly assaulted and taken away in a vehicle. There was no eyewitness, so the case rested on last-seen CCTV evidence from the petrol pump and from the main accused's house, and on recoveries made on disclosure statements.
The court found gaps at almost every step of the electronic evidence. The recorder from the main accused's house was seized unsealed four days after the incident, even though police had visited the house almost daily, and the pen drives holding copied footage were also not sealed. The recorder from the petrol pump was seized more than three months later. The bench held the footage inadmissible, noting that the faces in the video were not clearly visible and that the certificate required to prove the electronic record was defective.
Source: Pink City Post
Describing the investigation as, in the court's words, "casual, perfunctory and lackadaisical", the bench also rejected the trial court's finding that the killings were an honour killing, and answered the death reference in the negative.
DGP given two months for an evidence SOP
The court directed the Director General of Police to frame, within two months, a standard operating procedure for the collection, seizure, preservation and proof of electronic evidence, particularly CCTV footage and call detail records, in line with the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023. The SOP must cover prompt preservation requests, seizure of original storage devices or forensic copies with recorded hash values, documentation of timestamp discrepancies, and proper procurement of call records through service providers' nodal officers. Mandatory training was ordered for investigating officers, supervisory officers and public prosecutors, with a compliance report to be filed within three months.
Source: The420.in
The acquitted are Ramgopal alias Gopal, Mahadev, Mahendra Kumar Choudhary, Sandeep Gurjar, Beerbal Dhaka, Nandlal alias Nandkar, Madanlal Chandiwal, Sohanlal Jat, Babulal alias Harnek Faldoliya, Parsaram Chopra and Rajesh Kumar. The court ordered their release if they are not wanted in any other case, with each to furnish a bond of Rs 25,000 with a surety, valid for six months, in case the state approaches the Supreme Court.