The main legal point established in the judgment is the lack of justifiable reason for government interference in transferring investigations and the need for an independent investigative wing of the police to prevent political interference and ensure prompt arrest of offenders.

Complaining, Governments frequent interference in the investigation of a criminal case registered under Section 302 I. P. C. and other allied offences, petitioner has filed this writ petition seeking quashing of the order dated 26-5-2001, Annexure-5 whereby the Government directed CBCID to reinvestigate the aforesaid case.

2. The petitioners case in brief is that on 21-12-1999 at about 9 p. m. Ranvendra Pratap Singh and seven others armed with various lethal weapons assaulted his brother Fizaul Haq alias Afsar (hereinafter refereed to as the deceased) and as a result, he died on the spot. The deceased was the Gram Pradhan and one of the accused namely, Rashid Nazeer was the Block Pramukh at the relevant time and since the deceased did not agree to the illegal demand of the accused persons he was done to death. On a report being lodged, the local police sprang into action, registered case No. 100 of 1999 under Section 147, 148, 149, 302 and 506 IPC and proceeded with the investigation, in course of which he examined and recorded the statement of the eye-witnesses seized empty cartridges, blood stained earth etc. , held the inquest over the dead-body of the deceased and sent the same for post-mortem examination and arrested one of the accused namely, Zahirddin. In the meanwhile, the State Government without any sufficient cause and reason transferred the investigation most arbitrarily by order dated 6-1-2000, copy whereof at Annexure-4, from the local police and entrusted to CBCID. No reason was assigned as to what necessitated the Government to interfere with the investigation and denude the local police of their power to investigate the case. Upon receipt of the record and the case diary, the investigation officer of the CBCID proceeded with investigation afresh and recorded the statement of the petitioner and other witnesses. He concluded the investigation, prepared the charge sheet against the accused persons and forwarded the same to his superior officer in September, 2001. Petitioner was of the impression that ultimately the accused persons would be put on trial and justice will be done. But he was shocked to find that the accused persons in order to subvert the process of law obtained order from the State Government, Annexure-5 with the help of their political mentors for reinvestigation of the case. It is urged that the State Government does not have any power to direct the police to reinvestigation the case nor the police have any such power under law. The aforesaid order, Annexure-5 was passed with apparent design to keep the accused persons beyond the reach of the Court. In view of such background facts and circumstances petitioner had no other alternative but to file this petition seeking Courts intervention.

3. A number of counter-affidavits sworn to by some police officers as well as Joint Secretary and Under Secretary, Home Department, Lucknow have been filed. One Anil Kumar Srivastava, S. O. Sultanpur Ghosh police station in his affidavit has stated that pursuant to the first information report dated 21-12- 1999, the then investigation officer recorded the statement of the witnesses Belal Ahmad and others, arrested co-accused Zahir Uddin and moved an application to the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate for arrest of the absconding accused persons. Having obtained order from the Magistrate, he took steps to arrest the absconding accused persons and in the meanwhile on the basis of the order of the State Government dated 6-1-2000 investigation was transferred to CBCID.

4. One J. P. Yadav, Inspector CBCID, Senior Allahabad in his affidavit has stated that after the case was transferred to CBCID he was entrusted with the investigation. Accordingly he proceeded with the investigation in course of which he recorded the statement of Belal Ahmad and others, whose statements were earlier recorded by the civil police. Since his investigation revealed involvement of other accused persons, he sent a report to