NEW DELHI
“Isn’t it the norm to inform the nearest executive magistrate of the subdivisional magistrate on the second day from recovery itself regarding inquest proceedings for the unidentified body? Why wasn’t it carried out?” the court asked the officer from the Badshahpur police station of Gurugram, who handled the case, during the proceedings. The court was hearing a plea by Manchanda’s sister, Dr Harsimran Manchanda, through senior advocate Amit Prasad, seeking preservation and production of records and digital material related to the death. “How can a body be cremated along with the belongings? How can the law not be followed?… Do you not upload details of an unidentified body on Zipnet in cases of murder or otherwise? Isn’t that the procedure followed by Gurugram Police?” the judge asked. It also took note of the fact that the viscera had not been preserved during the post-mortem.
The court, besides flagging the absence of post-mortem examination videography, pulled up the Gurugram police over discrepancies between two post-mortem examination reports—one mentioning bullet injuries and the other attributing the cause of death to asphyxiation due to ante-mortem drowning.
A Delhi court on Saturday pulled up the Gurugram police over lapses in handling the body of real estate sales professional Yuvraj Singh Manchanda, who was found murdered, questioning why basic legal procedures were not followed and observing that the police’s failure deprived the deceased’s family of their “right to perform his last rites”. The court reserved its order on the application and said it would consider the sister’s apprehensions raised in the plea. Prasad alleged that the police actions amounted to destruction of evidence and were intended to “save the culprits”, arguing that the court had the ancillary powers to issue directions over the handling of the deceased’s body.
The judge observed that the police officer from the Badshahpur station had “no concrete response” to the questions. “The complainant not only lost her brother… you snatched away he family’s right to dutifully carry out his last rites,” the court said.
