Ultimatum for Delhi cops in Tanwar murder case

The Delhi high court on Thursday served an ultimatum on the Delhi police's crime branch, asking it to file a status report on the Tanwar murder case by October 16.

The ultimatum comes in the wake of the crime branch's failure to comply with the court directive, asking it to file the report by Thursday, August 21.

Rejecting the petitioner's demand for a Central Bureau of Investigation inquiry into the case at this stage, a division bench said, ''Let the position of the case be placed before the court on the next date of hearing on October 16, and then we will see what is required to be done.''

The bench, comprising Justices Arun Kumar and Dalveer Bhandari, asked Delhi government's standing counsel S K Aggarwal to file an additional affidavit. The counsel's note must list the steps taken in the case after the crime branch took over the case on April 4 from the Delhi police.

In its petition, the All India Young Lawyers Association said the CBI or a retired judge of the high court or the Supreme Court should handle the case as the crime branch had made little progress in the case.

Kamini Jaiswal, the petitioner's counsel, alleged that certain clues in the case have not been followed by the crime branch.

The association also alleged that the Delhi police was deliberately going slow in the matter due to ''political pressure''.

However, Aggarwal contended there was no truth in the petitioner's contention that there were a lot of similarities in the murders of Naina Sahni and Dr Tanwar who was considered close to Congress president Sitaram Kesri. The counsel said no similarities were found in the two post-mortem reports.

UNI

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