CHANDIGARH: A special CBI court in Chandigarh on Saturday convicted Himachal Pradesh inspector general Zahur Haider Zaidi and seven other cops in the Kotkhai custodial death case while acquitting then SP Dandu Wangyal Negi due to lack of evidence. The court will pronounce the quantum of punishment on Jan 27.
The other convicted policemen are DSP Manoj Joshi; Rajinder Singh, then SHO of Kotkhai police station; ASI Deep Chand Sharma; head constable Mohan Lal; head constable Surat Singh; head constable Rafi Mohammad and constable Ranjit Sateta.
All the convicts were taken into judicial custody after the verdict and will be presented in court at 10am on the day of the sentencing. The case pertains to the death of Suraj, an accused in the gang rape and murder of a 16-year-old girl in 2017, in police custody. In May 2019, Supreme Court had transferred the case from a Himachal court to Chandigarh CBI court.
Zaidi led team that made arrests
The guilty were convicted under IPC Sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 302 (murder), 330 (causing hurt to extort confession), 348 (wrongful confinement), 195 (fabricating false evidence), 196 (using false evidence), 218 (tampering with documents), and 201 (destruction of evidence).
In the case, the body of a Class 10 student was found in a forest in Kotkhai, Shimla , on July 4, 2017, two days after she went missing. A special investigation team led by IG Zaidi arrested six suspects, including Suraj.
