Those involved in Bhopal 'fake' encounter' should be dealth with strictly: Justice Katju

Amid allegations of fake encounter of eight undertrial SIMI operatives in Bhopal, former Supreme Court judge Justice Markandey Katju too raised questions through a series of Facebook posts saying that the officials and politicians involved in the action should be dealt with strictly. 

"In Prakash Kadam vs Ramprasad Vishwanath Gupta, a bench of the Supreme Court consisting of Justice Gyansudha Mishra and myself held that in cases of fake encounter death sentence must be given, as such act belongs to the 'rarest of rare' category, because a 'rakshak' had become a 'bhakshak'. We also said "Trigger happy policemen, who think they can do extra judicial killing and get away with it, should know that the gallows await them," Katju wrote in his Facebook post. 

"We also referred to the Nuremburg trials after the Second World War in which the Nazi war criminals pleaded 'orders are orders' but this plea was rejected and most of them were hanged. So I demand chargesheeting for murder not only the police officers and men who committed these cold blooded murders, but also the politicians ( including any Minister ) and senior bureaucratic and police officers who gave the order, and if found guilty, they must be hanged, he added.

"The alleged SIMI members are undertrials, not convicts. It is quite possible that some of them they may be found by the court to be not SIMI members at all.Also, the Supreme Court has held in Sri Indra Das vs. State of Assam ( see online ) that mere membership of a banned organisation does not make one a criminal, unless he does some act of violence or organises violence, or instigates imminent violence." Katju said in one of his posts.

In another post, Katju put several arguments claiming that the encounter was fake.