The Bombay High Court on Tuesday asked the Maharashtra government to submit the post-mortem and chemical analysis reports of the woman who was killed in a police-firing incident at Maval near Pune in 2011, to ascertain from which bullet she died.
A Division Bench of Justices A.S. Oka and A.P. Bhangale was hearing a PIL by activist I.G. Khandelwal seeking action against the police officers, including the then Superintendent of Police, Pune rural, Sandeep Karnik, for opening fire on a protesting mob and killing three persons.
The government had earlier informed the court in an affidavit that explanation was sought from four officers and after perusal of their replies a warning was issued to Karnik and disciplinary proceedings were initiated against three police officers — inspectors Ashok Patil and Yashwant Gawari and assistant inspector Ganesh Mane.
Khandelwal, however, had claimed that one woman had died after a bullet from Karnik’s gun hit her. He alleged that Karnik had taken someone else’s pistol and had fired at the mob and that it was Karnik’s bullet that killed one woman. He added that details about this are mentioned in the committee report and its annexures.
The court had then called for a copy of the M.G. Gaikwad Committee report along with the annexures and also original filed on the disciplinary enquiry against the errant police officers to verify the petitioners’ claims.
The reports were on Tuesday placed before the Bench but it did not have any details regarding the allegations and, therefore, sought the particulars of the probe results.
On August 8, 2011, police had opened fire on villagers protesting against the government’s decision to lay a closed pipeline to supply water from the Pavna dam to the limits of Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation. Agriculturists had claimed that they would not get water for their crops if the closed pipeline were laid.
