Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a plea seeking to constitute an independent expert committee to inquire into the killing of gangster-politician Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf amid police presence on April 24. The independent expert committee would be under the chairmanship of a former Supreme Court judge.
The duo were shot dead at point-blank range by three men posing as journalists in the middle of a media interaction on Saturday night while police personnel were escorting them to a medical college in Prayagraj for a checkup.
The UP Police was in dock over its claim that it had done '183' encounters in the past six months.
The plea sought the setting up of an independent expert committee to probe the killing of Atiq and Ashraf. "Issue guidelines/directions to safeguard the rule of law by constituting an independent expert committee under the chairmanship of a former Supreme Court justice to inquire into the 183 encounters which had occurred since 2017 as stated by Uttar Pradesh Special Director General of Police (Law and Order) and also to inquire into the police custody murder of Atiq and Ashraf," it said.
What plea said
Referring to Atiq's killing, the plea said that "such actions by police are a severe threat to democracy and rule of law and lead to a police state". "In a democratic society, the police cannot be allowed to become a mode of delivering final justice or to become a punishing authority. The power of punishment is only vested in the judiciary," the plea stated.
