Closure of Pathribal fake encounter case; Army asked to provide copy of judgement to victims’ family

Srinagar, February 15, 2014 (PPI-OT): In occupied Kashmir, a court in Srinagar has directed the Indian Army to provide in four weeks a copy of court-martial judgment that gave clean chit to five Army personnel, including four officers, in the 2000 Pathribal fake encounter case. The court directed the Army to furnish a copy of the judgment along with CBI charge sheet on its decision to close the case.

The Army court-martial had given clean chit to the troops and closed the case on January 23. However, the court-martial judgment was not provided to the family members of the victims. One of the family members of the fake encounter case victims moved an application through the High Court Bar Association of the territory before the court seeking the court-martial judgment and other documents.

The applicant has pleaded that family member of the civilians who were killed in the fake encounter are not able to approach the Army court or the CBI Special Branch Chandigarh for obtaining the copies of detailed judgment of court-martial and the CBI charge sheet.

It is to mention here that on March 25, 2000, five people were killed in a fake encounter by Indian Army in Pathribal area of Islamabad district and were labelled as foreign militants responsible for killing of 35 Sikhs at Chattisinghpora five days before the encounter. However, the investigations proved that the victims were innocent civilians who were killed in cold-blood by the Army.

Meanwhile, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court has handed over the investigation of Tufail Matoo case to Crime Branch (CB) of police and asked it to file investigation report within eight weeks. A bench of Justice Virender Singh after quashing the trial court order accepting closure report of investigation by Special Investigation Team directed the Director General of police to handover the investigation to Crime Branch. Tufail was killed on June 11, 2010, after being hit by a teargas shell fired by Indian police near Rajouri Kadal.

On the other hand, the Superintendent of Police (SP) Sopore has once again denied information under Right to Information Act (RTI) to father of Ubair Mushtaq of Watergam (Rafiabad) who was killed in the firing of Indian Central Reserve Police Force on February 10, last year. The court had directed the authorities to inform the family about the investigation from time to time, family of late Ubair said.

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