The damaged paying guest accommodation in Sector 32 after fire in February. (Photo: Kamleshwar Singh)
Denying the role of an accused, Nitish Popli, in the paying guest accommodation fire incident which happened on February 22, the UT Police in a status report submitted at the district court has stated that “Nitish Popli has withdrawn his share from this partnership in the month of September 2019 and after this Nitesh Bansal is the single owner of PG”.
The fire incident happened at a PG accommodation in Sector 32, Chandigarh, when three girls — Muskan (21), Pakshi (19), and Riya (20) — were burnt alive in the major fire. The Chandigarh Police had booked owner of the house Gaurav Aneja, and the two PG owners, Nitish Popli and Nitesh Bansal, under sections 188, 304, 336, 34 of IPC at Sec 34 PS. The case was transferred to Crime Branch.
The status report has been filed by the Crime Branch in the court of ADJ Rajesh Sharma over the anticipatory bail filed by Kamlesh Aneja, mother of Gaurav Aneja, and Kashish Aneja, wife of Gaurav Aneja, who were granted interim bail on July 15.
The status report said, “It was found that owner Gaurav Aneja had rented the Kothi for PG to Nitesh Bansal and Nitish Popli. The violation of building bye-laws was done on a stupendous level by Bansal. From the statements of PG warden Jasmir Kaur and bank account statements of Bansal and his father Madan Lal and Popli, it becomes clear that Popli had withdrawn his share from partnership in September 2019 and Bansal is the single owner of PG.”
The report mentioned that Kamlesh and Kashish said during probe that they had purchased the house in 2018, rented it to Bansal and Popli for three years. The bank transactions and maintenance of the house were handled by Gaurav Aneja. Their statements are yet to be cross-verified.
The police opposed Bansal’s plea of seeking default bail citing incomplete chargesheet and said, chargesheet could not be completed due to lockdown and as CFSL report of the case is awaited.