Widows will be protected, given justice: Supreme Court

NEW DELHI - The widows will be protected and given justice, said the Supreme Court Monday while setting aside an Allahabad High Court order transferring the trial in a murder case against a Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) legislator from Kanpur to Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh.

The court said this while hearing a petition filed by the widow of a government engineer killed by legislator Shekhar Tripathi.

The apex court bench of Justice Markandey Katju and Justice Gyan Sudha Misra transferred the trial of Tripathi and BSP’s Kanpur district president Yogendra Dohare alias Bhatia back to the court of the special judge, Ayodhya Prakaran (incident), at Lucknow.

The high court had earlier transferred the trial of Tripathi and Bhatia and others from the court of special judge (Ayodhya Prakaran) to the court of the special judge (gangsters act), Kanpur.

The apex court was told that on the intervening night of Dec 23-24, 2008, petitioner Shashi Gupta’s husband Manoj Kumar Gupta was initially threatened then subsequently brutally murdered by Tripathi, Bhatia and nine others.

Manoj Gupta invited the wrath of the legislator and other party workers because as an executive engineer posted in the public works department, Auraiya, he refused to pass the false bills of some contractors.

The deceased before being killed was stripped naked and given electric shocks.

Appearing for the petitioner, counsel Kamini Jaiswal told the court that the case against the accused was transferred when the hearing before the special judge was at the fag end of the trial proceedings.

The trial was transferred to Kanpur before the court dealing with cases under the gangster act which, in fact, meant the dilution of the charges against the accused, Jaiswal told the court.

What the accused could not get from the front door, he got it from the back door, Jaiswal told the court.