A sessions court in Delhi on Monday set aside a trial court order that had directed Delhi Police to investigate Delhi Law Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Kapil Mishra’s alleged role in the 2020 North-east Delhi riots, Bar and Bench reported.
Special Judge (PC Act) Dig Vinay Singh of the Rouse Avenue Courts quashed the order issued on April 1 by Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) Vaibhav Chaurasiya.
The order had been passed on a plea filed by Mohammad Ilyas, a resident of Yamuna Vihar. Ilyas had sought the registration of an FIR against Mishra, alleging that he had participated in the riots.
According to Ilyas, he saw Mishra and others blocking a road in Kardampuri, Northeast Delhi, and damaging vendors’ carts during the violence. He also claimed that a senior Delhi Police officer was present beside Mishra at the time.
Magistrate had questioned police investigation
In his earlier order, Magistrate Chaurasiya had raised doubts about the Delhi Police’s investigation into the alleged conspiracy behind the riots. He noted that the police’s theory that the violence was a pre-planned conspiracy by anti-CAA protesters was based on “questionable assumptions, guesswork and interpretations”.
The police had claimed that the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests were not spontaneous but were used as a front to carry out organised violence in the city, Bar and Bench reported.
“Once these flaws are outlined, therefore the theory goes off and so does the lens with which prosecution seeks to interpret the facts,” the Magistrate had observed.
This story was originally published in business-standard.com. Read the full story here.
