Court asks police to arrest accused Army officer accused in Custodial Disappearance
The state high court has slammed Special Investigation Team (SIT) of police for not arresting an army officer, who was involved in custodial disappearance of a youth in Srinagar 13 years ago.
The court directed SIT to go ahead with the arrest of Major Kishore Malhotra of 36 Rastriya Rifles (RR) who was allegedly involved in disappearance of one Manzoor Ahmad Dar of Rawalpora, Srinagar in January 2002.
The relatives of the disappeared person had approached court through their counsel Mian Qayoom after they failed to find their kin.On court directions, FIR No. 33/2002 under section 364 was registered in P/S Sadar, Srinagar and SIT was constituted to investigate the matter. Â The court had also directed CJM, Budgam to inquire into the matter.
CJM in its inquiry report substantiated that Manzoor was picked up by 35 Rashtriya Rifles personnel during the intervening night of 18/19th January 2002. However, it stated  that efforts to ensure presence of Major Kishore Malhotra and other personnel of 35 RR for investigation failed.
A single bench of Justice Husnain Masoodi said the SIT Instead of approaching the authorities for prosecution of Major Kishore Malhotra should have arrested the accused army Major and subjected him to custodial interrogation to find out the circumstances in which Manzoor was picked up and disappeared.
Bench said the accused Major (now promoted as Colonel) should have been arrested for offence punishable under section 364 RPC.
High court directed the SIT to proceed with investigation keeping in view the observations and submit the fresh status report by next date of hearing.
It also sought personal appearance of Station House Officer (SHO) Police Station Sadder for presenting the fresh status report.
