Chandigarh, August 5
Nachhatar Singh will come face to face with the man he “murdered” 13 years ago.

It may sound incredible but exactly a month from today, he will meet Jagsir Singh for whose “murder” he has already spent five years in jail.

Jagsir Singh’s “body” was found in a canal and identified by his father. There was also an ‘eyewitness’ to the murder and the prosecution had also relied on extra-judicial confession by Nachhatar Singh and two others. During the trial, two police officials had also appeared as prosecution witnesses.

Nachhatar Singh is now demanding not only a CBI probe but also a monetary compensation of Rs 20 lakh. He also wants to know whose body was recovered by the police. Jagsir Singh’s father Sukhdev Singh lodged the FIR, alleging his son was missing ever since tenant Nachhatar Singh came to his house on June 5, 1996. Nachhatar Singh was not vacating the land and had asked him to send his son Jagsir for payment.

The prosecution claimed Jagsir Singh’s body was recovered on June 6, 1996 from a canal in Gharauli. As Nachhatar Singh’s appeal against conviction came up for hearing this morning, Punjab and Haryana High Court asked the ghost who walks to remain present in the court on September 5.

The Bench of Justice Mehtab Singh Gill and Justice Jitendra Chauhan took note of the statement of an ASI that Jagsir Singh is lodged in Ludhiana central jail and had refused to accept the summon.

The Bench ordered the Ludhiana SSP to produce Jagsir in court on the next date of hearing. Jagsir had apparently changed his name to Baldev Singh and had relocated to Rattowal village in Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar. It was apparently a conspiracy hatched by the father and son duo to teach the tenant, Nachchatar Singh, a lesson.

False cases by the police even in the case of murder was always suspected but the case has apparently confirmed the worst fears.