Herojit’s statement can be recorded: SC

By Paojel Chaoba

IMPHAL | Jan 8

The Supreme Court today observed that the judicial confession of Herojit can be recorded before any judicial magistrate in Delhi and accordingly vicarious liabilities can be fixed.

Of the over 90 cases that the Supreme Court had directed to the CBI Special Investigation Team to investigate in its July 14, 2017 judgment, only 11 FIRs have been registered as per Supreme Court Office Report.

The FIRs are treated as top secret in nature as no details could be obtained from the CBI. Out of the 90 cases taken up for charge-sheeting, only 11 FIRs have been registered and it is not disclosed who the policemen and which incident they are implicated in.

It may be mentioned that the First Information Report (FIR) is a public document and there is no reasonable explanation why the CBI is withholding relevant information on these, as per the amicus curie, of EEVFAM,Colin Gonsalves.

Moreover, the FIRs have been delivered to the respective judge’s residence by ‘special messenger’ and the details of the same have not been furnished to the petitioner either.

The amicus put before the court that the CBI has taken six months to register only 11 FIRs and at this rate it will take over four years to register the 92 cases. This will consume over 20 years to register the 1528 cases, he contended in the court.

 It is worth mentioning that the National Human Rights Commissions, judicial enquiries and commissions of enquiry have submitted their findings in all these 92 cases. The court also observed that the CBI started registration of the 11 FIRs only from October, 2017 and maximum of them were registered in December last year which is at the fag end of the period given by the court to investigate and submit chargesheets.

The petitioner’s counsel contended that considering these counter-narratives are already available in the official documents, the FIRs ought to have been registered promptly by the CBI and should have been able to chargesheet over 60 cases by now. Moreover, no witnesses have been examined and their statement under 164 CrPC recorded by the CBI so far.

The court further discussed the criminal miscellaneous petition number 1018 of 2018 in relation to the sworn affidavit filed by Herojit on January 5 (details of which are in a separate report).

Remarkably, the court intently took notice of the case of HC Herojit and observed that 164 statement of Herojit can be recorded in Delhi itself and consequently ‘vicarious liabilities’ can be fixed. (Vicarious liability refers to a situation where someone is held responsible for the actions or omissions of another person. In a workplace context, an employer can be liable for the acts or omissions of its employees, provided it can be shown that they took place in the course of their employment.) 

It may be mentioned that Herojit had contended that Akoijam Jhalajit had given the order to kill Sanjit. 

 The court has sought detail report of July 23, 2009 Bir Tikendrajit  road, fake encounter case and the details of the missing diaries of Herojit from the counsel of the EEVFAM petitioner, a source from Delhi said.