Suicide by family: Ex-DIG, four other get 8-year-jail
A former DIG and four others were sentenced to eight-year imprisonment by a local court in a 2004 case in which a family of five had committed suicide, blaming the accused for the extreme step. A serving DSP of the Punjab Police was also sentenced to four years in jail. The court of Additional District Sessions Judge Sandeep Singh Bajwa also slapped fine ranging from Rs 10,000 to Rs 20,000 on them.
Former DIG Kultar Singh, DSP Hardev Singh, Parminder Kaur, Palwinder Singh, Mohinder Singh and Sabreen Kaur were convicted in the case on Monday.
Kultar Singh was posted as the Amritsar senior superintendent of police while DSP Hardev Singh held the charge of an inspector in 2004 when the family committed suicide.
Hardip Singh, along with his wife, mother and two children, had taken some poisonous substance on October 31, 2004.
Before taking the extreme step, the entire family had written a suicide note on the walls of a room of their house.
They also sent copies of the suicide note to their friends and some known people by post.
The family had directly blamed Kultar Singh for the extreme step.
The Amritsar police had registered a case in 2004 when public pressure mounted but the accused were not arrested then.
In 2009, Punjab Human Rights Organisation (PHRO) activist Sarabjit Singh Verka took up the matter before a local court and sought justice for the victims while alleging that the local police was not probing the case properly.
The court issued non-bailable warrants in September 2011 against Kultar Singh and Hardev Singh under Sections 306 (abetment to suicide), 420 (fraud), 467 and 468 (forgery of documents), 471 (using forged document as genuine) of the Indian Penal Code and 7/13 of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
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