Two more accused in Dara case get bail

JAIPUR: A few days after senior IPS officer A Ponnuchami got bail from the high court in the Dara Singh fake encounter case, two more police officers were granted bail on Tuesday.
Dara Singh was allegedly killed in a shoot-out by a team of special operations group (SOG) of Rajasthan Police on the outskirts of Jaipur on October 23, 2006.
The court of Justice Nisha Gupta on Tuesday granted bail to sub inspector Nisar Khan and constable Badri Prasad on the ground that similarly accused in the case were given bail earlier.Nisar Khan has been in jail since March 11, 2011.
The court accepted the plea of counsels for petitioners that similarly placed co-accused Surender Singh and Sardar Singh were released on bail earlier.
After that, IG Ponnuchami was granted bail for a month to meet his ailing mother.
The counsel for Badri Prasad pointed out that the prosecution itself says it was a conspiracy between then minister Rajendra Rathore and additional DGP AK Jain. Badri Prasad was only a constable and he could not be made part of the conspiracy. The petitioners have been implicated only on the basis of call details that they were found in the vicinity of Raghavji ki Dhani.
They pointed out that call details could not connect the petitioners with the crime as the SOG office is situated in the vicinity of Raghavji ki Dhani.
The CBI counsel argued that there are two sets of the accused. One who hatched the conspiracy — Rajendra Rathore and AK Jain, while Arshad Ali was made to execute the conspiracy. The petitioners were part of the raiding party. According to the prosecution, Badri Prasad opened fire which caused Dara's death. The other contention of the prosecution against granting bail was that Badri Prasad was not cooperating with the investigation. However, he had surrendered to the police on July 25, 2011 after he was declared a proclaimed offender on May 14, 2011.
Both of them were in jail for about three years in connection with the case. The court then granted bail on a personal bond of one lakh each and two surety bonds of Rs 50,000.
Dara Singh's widow filed a case at Mansarovar police station in Jaipur against the four cops, including AK Jain and Ponnuchami, alleging the shoot-out was stage-managed and approached the Supreme Court for a fair investigation. The Supreme Court handed over the investigation to the CBI.