17 years on, 18 cops booked in Jalalabad fake encounter case

The then Superintendent of Police, Additional Superintendent of Police, three circle officers and in-charges of 10 police stations are among the 18 accused. Superintendent of Police, Shahjahanpur, S Anand, said the investigation of the case has been transferred to the crime branch of the district police.

The officer added that the case was filed on the directives of the sessions court of Shahjahanpur. The complainant had moved court after a local court rejected his plea seeking direction to register an FIR.

Police said that as per the record, an investigation was conducted in 2014 by the district police and later by the UP Police Crime Branch (CID), which gave clean chit to the policemen concerned.

The Shahjahanpur court accepted the closure report filed subsequently.

In the magisterial inquiry too, the policemen were given clean chit, said station house officer, Jalalabad police station, Jai Shankar Singh. He added that “almost all the police officers named in the case have retired.”

According to sources, two persons, identified only as Prahlad and Dhanpal, were gunned down in an alleged encounter at Chachuapur village on October 3, 2004. The police declared them to be members of a dacoity gang.

Prahlad‘s brother Ram Kirti, who is the complainant in the case, has denied the police claim and alleged that they (police) had gunned down innocent persons. Later, the police planted guns and cartridges to make it appear that they were dreaded dacoits, he alleged in his complaint.