Delhi Police on Thursday filed two chargesheets before a local court in connection with alleged murder cases during the communal violence in north-east Delhi in February. While one of the chargesheets was related to the murder of four Muslim youths, including two brothers, the other one was Dilbar Negi murder case.
Negi was killed during riots in New Mustafabad and based on eyewitnesses accounts and technical evidences, 12 accused were arrested in the case.
The Crime Branch of Delhi Police filed both the chargesheets before Metropolitan Magistrate Richa Parihar who has put up the matters for further hearing on June 18. The chargesheets were filed under Sections 147 and 148 (rioting), 149 (unlawful assembly), 302 (murder), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence) of the Indian Penal Code. The offences entail a maximum punishment of death sentence.
On February 27, four bodies were recovered from north-east Delhi’s Johripur drain, of which two were of brothers Amir Ali (31) and Hashim (19), the police said. The brothers were allegedly beaten to death by a mob when they were returning to their house on the night of February 26, the chargesheet said.
WhatsApp trail
During investigation, it was found that a WhatsApp group was created in the intervening night of February 25-26, during peak rioting, and two of its members have been arrested, the chargesheet said. The group had 125 members. While some of the members were only sending and receiving chats, few others were involved in “active rioting”, the police said.
On the basis of eyewitness accounts and technical evidences, police arrested nine people for murdering Hashim, while eleven were arrested for killing Amir.
The accused were identified as Rishabh, Sumit Chaudhary, Ankit, Himanshu Thakur, Pankaj, Jatin and several others who all are named in the chargesheet with the specific role they played during riots and killing of Muslims. “Pankaj was the group admin. It was created to mobilise crowd to attack Muslims,” said a police officer.