Fake money case: Report on hostile police witness self-contradictory

A copy of the report,that was prepared in October 2008,was handed over to the High Court last week as hearing in the PIL resumed. The PIL was filed after Justice Ranjit Singh took a suo motu cognizance of a news item in an English daily in which it was highlighted as to how all the witnesses,police officers in the case,had resiled from their statements in the court.

In his nine findings given in the report,Reddy gives details of the evidence gathered to conclude that witnesses were influenced.

Consider this: “In the reasons given by the police witnesses for their resiling,it is amply clear that Gurcharan Singh Pherurai,has the resources to influence the witnesses of the case. From the call details of the witnesses and police officers who called them it is clear that the witnesses were influenced to help the accused. As the police witnesses were called by vigilance officers,despite the fact they were not facing any corruption case or vigilance inquiry”.

The other findings state: “It has also come on record from the call details that police witnesses were in close touch with the accused of the case,during the month of September 2007 and first week of October 2007. The timing and long duration of calls caste aspersion on their role in influencing the witnesses. The call details of the police witnesses show that they were called by the accused before their evidence in the court,whereas there was no reason for accused to call the witnesses except influencing the witnesses of the case”.

It also adds that four police witnesses were taken to the District Courts (Ambala) by the accused a day before the actual evidence “goes on to indicate that they were made to understand regarding the manner in which they would have to depose in the court” the next day.

“Gurcharan Singh Pherurai,former SSP is an influential person. From the points mentioned above it is clear that the police witnesses seem to have been influenced at the instance of the accused in this case as one of the accused”,Reddy states in the report.

Further the report states that had any such pressure was used on them they should have approached their senior officers for remedial measures,which they did not do,for the reasons best known to them.

Recommending departmental action against all six police witnesses,the report states: “It was the prime duty of the witnesses of the case to have stated the truth in the court. They have not performed this duty in the right earnest”.