New Delhi: The SC studying the report submitted in the Disha Hyderabad encounter case on Friday directed the Telangana High Court to take action on the commission’s report. A three-member committee inquiry committee that probed the encounter of the four gang rape and murder accused of a veterinarian in Hyderabad had submitted the report to the apex court today.
The bench comprising Justice NV Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli that the 2019 encounter at Hyderabad was fake and recommended that the 10 police officers be tried for murder for the killing of four rape and murder accused. According to the panel, police version claiming that the accused snatched pistol and tried to escape was unbelievable and not backed by evidence.
“In our considered opinion, the accused were deliberately fired upon with an intent to cause their death and with the knowledge that the firing would invariably result in the death of the deceased suspect,” the report read.
The subsequent killing of the four accused in police custody was referred to ‘Disha encounter’ that took place in 2019. The name Disha was given by Hyderabad police to the rape and murder victim to protect her identity. She was a veterinary assistant surgeon at a state-run hospital and was attacked one night by the four men at the NH-44 near Hyderabad.
The four men had raped and smothered the woman to death and then loaded her body into a truck and burned it under a bridge later that night. As the incident sparked nationwide outrage, the Telangana police came under pressure to deliver punishment without delay on the basis of a fast-track court trial.
The Sirpurkar panel was set up shortly after the incident to probe the circumstances that led to the encounter.