The court ruled that monitoring of an investigation is necessary until a charge-sheet is filed, after which the ordinary legal process should take over.

JUDGMENT :

A.S. GADKARI, J.

1. Petitioners i.e. the daughter and daughter-in-law of late Comrade Govindrao P. Pansare have invoked jurisdiction of this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, for a Writ of Mandamus or any other Writ, Order or direction in the nature of mandamus, directing the Respondent No. 1 for appointing an independent Special Investigation Team (SIT) led by the Additional Director General of Police and comprising of Officers of the ranks of Inspector General of Police and other Senior Officers of impeccable credentials to conduct an investigation into the conspiracy and gruesome murder of Shri Govind Pansare, and to take all necessary consequential steps, actions pertaining thereto and provide them necessary facilities and support and to monitor the investigation to be carried out by the SIT sought to be constituted through the present Petition till the investigation is reached to its logical conclusion.

2. Heard Mr. Grover, learned senior counsel for the Petitioners. Mr. Mundargi, learned senior counsel, Spl. P.P. for the State and Mr. Jha, learned counsel for the accused Mr. Tawade. Perused entire record and the Notes of Arguments tendered across the bar by the Advocate for the Petitioners.

3. Record indicates that, Shri Govind P. Pansare and his wife Smt. Uma G. Pansare were shot at by two unknown assailants riding on a motor- cycle, on a public road near the house of Shri Pansare, at about 9.15 a.m. on 16th February, 2015. Initially a crime bearing No. 39 of 2015 under Sections 307 r/w 34 of the Indian Penal Code and under Section 3(25) of the Arms Act was registered with Rajarampuri Police Station, Kolhapur at the instance of Shri Mukund D. Kadam. Injured Mr. Govindrao Pansare succumbed to injuries on 20th February, 2015 while undergoing treatment at Breach Candy Hospital, Mumbai and therefore Section 302 of the IPC is added to the crime.

3.1 Initially Rajarampuri Police Station, Kolhapur investigated the crime and thereafter the investigation was transferred to Special Investigation Team (SIT), Kolhapur. That, under the supervision of Additional Director General of Police (CID), Maharashtra State, Pune, the investigation was conducted by the said SIT. During the course of investigation names of 12 accused were revealed. The SIT arrested 10 accused persons and two accused namely Vinay B. Pawar and Sarang D. Akolkar @ Kulkarni were reported to be absconding. That, initially a charge-sheet was filed against the accused No. 1, Sameer Gaikwad on 14th December, 2015 and subsequently, 4 supplementary charge-sheets have been filed against the said 10 accused persons.

4. As the petitioners were of the view that, there was no major headway in the investigation of the said crime, they filed Interim Application No. 2361 of 2022, for handing over the investigation of the present crime to a dedicated team of ATS, Maharashtra. It was the contention of the Petitioners that, the SIT failed to trace out the absconding accused persons who were the actual shooters and there was no major headway in the said investigation. This Court by a detailed Order dated 3rd August, 2022 passed in Interim Application No. 2361 of 2022, directed the Additional Director General of Police, ATS to constitute a team of ATS Officers on similar manner, as constituted earlier and the said team to include some of the Officers of SIT who have been investigating the said case and are in the know-how of the investigation carried out, till the date of passing of the said Order.

4.1 Paragraph Nos. 39 and 41 of the said Order are reproduced hereinbelow for the sake of brevity:

“39. No doubt, SIT has taken steps, however, we do not find any major headway being made in the said investigation. Despite the efforts of the Officers of SIT, there is no breakthrough. This Court in the aforesaid petition has been monitoring the investigation since 2016. SIT has been regularly submitting reports with respect to steps taken to nab the shooters. However,