M A I N   N E W S

5 Punjab police officials get bail

CALCUTTA, July 18 (PTI) — The Calcutta High Court today granted bail to five Punjab police officials, including a superintendent of police (SP) and a deputy superintendent of police (DSP), in a 1993 murder case, in which a lower court has convicted them.

Bathinda SP Sant Kumar Singh and DSP Sukhdev Singh Chahal and three other police officials, sentenced to life imprisonment by the Alipore Additional Sessions Court, were granted bail by a Division Bench comprising Mr Justice Nure-e-Alam Chowdhury and Mr Justice P.K. Sen.

The five officials had been charged by the CBI with killing a couple — Bashir Mohammad, alias Lachmi Singh, and Sakina Begum, alias Rani Singh — in Tiljala in Calcutta on May 17, 1993. The CBI probe had been ordered by the Supreme Court.

The Alipore Additional Sessions Court found all five guilty and sentenced them to life imprisonment and slapped a fine of Rs 5000 on each. The accused, who deny the charges, challenged their conviction in the high court.

The defence counsel maintain that the police officers had never come to the place of occurrence of the killing and so the question of murder by them did not arise.