SHILLONG: Acting on a directive from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the state government has decided to hand over the case pertaining to the killing of Sengbath Ch. Marak, the son of Nokma at Oragitok, West Garo Hills to CID.
Informing this in the State Assembly, Meghalaya Home Minister Roshan Warjri said that besides the CID probe, a separate magisterial inquiry was already underway.
The Minister was replying to a call attention motion moved by James Sangma (NPP) on the demand of CSWO to take action against the police officers for killing the villager by way of fake encounter.
She said as per the existing NHRC guidelines, the post mortem examination of the deceased was conducted by a team of doctors and the entire procedure was videographed.
“A copy of the post-mortem report and that of videotape would also be sent to NHRC by the concerned SP shortly,” she said
The Minister said that in strict compliance with the NHRC guidelines, the Deputy Commissioner, West Garo Hills on March 7 instituted a magisterial inquiry to be conducted by an additional district magistrate with the terms of reference which include recording of the statements under oath of all the individuals including police personnel present on duty and having information pertaining to the incident under videography to ascertain and establish the chain of events leading to the exchange of fire and death of the individual; other information, which is relevant to the incident and felt appropriate to be placed on record by the magistrate such as eye witness accounts and forensic evidence.
In view of the serious nature of the inquiry, all depositions and statements will be recorded in camera and individually in case of each witness and deponent to establish and corroborate eye witness accounts.
