The Central Bureau of Investigation has taken over the investigation into the alleged assault of a colonel by Punjab police personnel and registered two separate FIRs, officials said on Friday.
The alleged incident took place on the intervening night of March 13 and 14 at a roadside dhaba in Patiala, Punjab.
The CBI has re-registered both the FIRs filed by the Civil Lines Police Station, Patiala, as its own separate cases on the orders of the Punjab and Haryana high court earlier this month.
The agency has tasked its Special Crime unit to do the probe, they said.
Colonel Pushpinder Singh Bath and his son were having food at a roadside dhaba (eatery) in Patiala when a group of seven to eight men allegedly beat them over an altercation related to the parking of the car.
The father-son duo was on its way from Delhi, where the colonel is posted, to Patiala in their car and had stopped at 'Harbans Dhaba' for a meal when the alleged incident took place, the FIR filed by the victim had alleged.
He also claimed that the assailants -- four inspector-rank officers of the Punjab Police and their armed subordinates -- attacked him and his son without any provocation, snatched his ID card and mobile phone, and threatened him with a "fake encounter", all in public view and under CCTV camera coverage.
In the second FIR taken over by the CBI, the owner of the eatery alleged that the occupants of a car had parked their vehicle in the middle of the road where they were drinking when a "minor scuffle" took place between them and some passersby and the individuals in an unknown car.
On the petition of Col Bath, the high court had marked the probe into the assault case to the Chandigarh Police on April 3 and directed it to complete the investigation within four months.
Acting on a fresh plea of the officer, Justice Rajesh Bhardwaj handed over the probe to the CBI and directed the Chandigarh police to hand over the complete records of the case to the agency.
"The complainant kept running from pillar to post, but no FIR was lodged at his behest. However, the FIR was lodged eight days after the occurrence, ie, on March 22, 2025. The accused in the present case were identified to be the police officials, and thus, the complainant, apprehending no fair investigation, earlier approached this Court by way of filing CRM-M-16421-2025 seeking transfer of the investigation," Justice Rajesh Bhardwaj said.
He noted that the court had entrusted the investigation outside Punjab to the Chandigarh Police to ensure an impartial investigation, but the Court found no change in the situation.
"Without completing the investigation, when the investigating agency has already deleted the offence under Section 109 BNS (Section 307 IPC), the approach of the investigating agency is clear enough," the court said in its order.
He said the investigating agency is not only trying to create loopholes in the investigation, but also trying to make craters in the investigation to ensure that once the chargesheet is filed before the court, the case of the prosecution should hardly be able to crawl in the court.
"Weighing the facts and circumstances of the present case on the anvil of law settled, this court finds that there are no prospects of free and fair investigation in the case by the Investigating Agency of UT, Chandigarh," the court had said while entrusting the CBI with the probe.
The court stated that, so far as progress in the investigation is concerned, except for saying that the investigation is in progress, there is no material to convince the court that the investigation is being carried out in a free and fair manner.
The investigation of the case is handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation, it said.