CIC seeks Batla House encounter documents from Delhi Police

By TwoCircles.net staff reporter.
New Delhi: Giving a big jolt to the Delhi Police the Central Information Commission (CIC) has asked it to submit before the commission all documents related to the Batla House encounter in which two suspected terrorists and Police Inspector Mohan Chand Sharma were killed at Batla House area in Jamia Nagar on September 19, 2008.

Since the encounter, the Delhi Police has refused to part with the documents like copy of FIR and post-mortem report about the encounter. The CIC has given the police time till March 5 to furnish before the commission the copies of the FIR registered by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police, post-mortem reports of the terror suspects Atif Amin and Sajid and Inspector Sharma.
The CIC bench headed by Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah gave the directive to the police on March 3 on an application filed by eminent Supreme Court lawyer Prashant Bhushan.

Prashant Bhushan is representing Ziaur Rahman, son of the caretaker of L-18 flat where the encounter took place. Rahman has been made accused in the Delhi serial blasts that took place on September 13 last year.

Earlier RTI activist Afroz Alam Sahil had also made several attempts to get the documents but he was denied.

On September 25, 2008, Sahil had submitted an RTI application with Delhi Police seeking information on post-mortem reports of those killed in the encounter, the First Information Report (FIR) and other details. He also submitted a similar application with All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). The petitioner had sought information on how the corpses were brought to the hospital after the encounter, when and how many corpses were examined post-mortem, at which level was it done and who was the doctor, and were these corpses handed over to the police or their family members? However, both the Delhi Police and AIIMS refused to divulge any of the information sought.