The duty of the police to conduct fair investigations and the court's obligation to ensure proper enforcement of criminal law.

ORDER :

Pursuant to the order dated 18.10.2022 passed by this Court, the ADG, CID and the I.O. of the case being Lakhisarai P.S. Case No. 443 of 2014 registered for the offences alleged under Sections 302/34/120B IPC read with Section 27 of the Arms Act are present with the records including the case diary.

2. Mr. Md. Nadim Seraj, learned GP-5 represents the State and on instruction from ADG, CID he has assisted this Court. Mr. Amit Narayan, learned Advocate for the petitioner, Mr. Ajay Kumar Thakur assisted by Dr. Anjani Prasad Singh, learned Advocate for Respondent No. 6 and Mr. Sanjeev Kumar Singh, learned Advocate for Respondent nos. 7 and 8 have been heard.

3. On 18.10.2022, after hearing learned counsel for the parties and the State, this Court formed a prima facie opinion that: (1) the matter relating to release of private respondent nos. 6 to 8 on personal bond in the facts of the present case and the materials in which the I.O. himself had been seeking their custodial interrogation at one stage coupled with the fact that their privilege for anticipatory bail was canceled by the Hon’ble Supreme Court requires consideration in accordance with law and (2) the fact that the CID has kept the investigation of the case pending with it for eight years and there is no whisper in the counter affidavit explaining the reasons for the huge and inordinate delay in conduct of investigation in a murder case, the grievance of the petitioner that the case is not being properly investigated and she has lost confidence in the investigating agency requires consideration.

4. For a ready reference, the order dated 18.10.2022 is being reproduced hereunder:-

“This Court in the present writ application has been considering the conduct of the Investigating Agency so far in the matter of investigation of the case being Lakhisarai P.S. Case No. 443 of 2014 registered for offences alleged under Sections 302/34/120(B) IPC read with Section 27 of the Arms Act. The grievance of the petitioner is that on the one hand the I.O. of the case released the named accused persons on personal bond despite the fact that their privilege of anticipatory bail granted by this Court had been cancelled by the Hon’ble Supreme Court and they were directed to surrender in police station, at the same time the investigation of the case has been kept pending by the State C.I.D. for over eight years without there being any progress in the case.

The facts of the case as revealed in the First Information Report are that when the husband of the petitioner was sitting at the varandah of his house, he was shot dead by a person who was holding pistol in his hand. This petitioner is an eye-witness to the alleged occurrence. In her written complaint to police, she has specifically alleged that in the year 2009 August, one Anil Sharma, M.D., Amrapagali Group with the help of the other named accused persons including private respondent nos. 6 to 8 in the present writ application had taken control of the trust and had forcibly removed her father who was Secretary of the trust, whereafter disputes were going on and in relation to those disputes records were available in the police station. It is alleged that the entire income of Balika Vidyapith were unlawfully taken into control of two persons namely, Dr. Praveen Sinha and Dr. Shyam Sundar Singh. A specific allegation is that at their instance on previous occasions in the campus of the school firings were done and her husband and other officers were being threatened regularly. Her husband was being asked to leave Lakhisarai failing which he would have to face dire consequences. It is stated that to weaken the case lodged by her husband against unauthorized opening of account of the Trust and on finding that during his lifetime it would not be possible for the accused persons to take complete control of the Trust, the husband of the petitioner was threatened on 31.07.2014 and it was told by one employee Shri Radhe Shyam Singh that her husban