Because of serious contradictions in eyewitness accounts and lapses in proving CCTV footage, a Delhi court has acquitted five men accused of being part of a mob that vandalised and set fire to a mosque in northeast Delhi’s Karawal Nagar during the Northeast Delhi riots in 2020, holding that the prosecution failed to establish their involvement.
The five men — Ankit, Sourabh Sharma, Rohit, Rahul Kumar and Sachin — were facing charges including rioting, being members of an unlawful assembly, damaging property and setting the mosque on fire. The judge, however, extended them the benefit of the doubt and acquitted them of all charges. The judge further noted that Ahmad had also testified that he remained confined to his house for about four days after the incident. The judge observed that the two police personnel had seen rioting at several locations in the area that day, but their accounts did not consistently establish when they were at the mosque.
Additional Sessions Judge Parveen Singh of the Karkardooma courts, in a judgement passed on October 31, observed that the two police personnel presented as eyewitnesses gave accounts that were inconsistent with the testimony of a resident living opposite the mosque.
His account, the court said, “was difficult to reconcile with the police witnesses’ claim that the mosque was attacked again during the day on February 25”. “ASI Mithilesh also did not give a clear account of the mosque being vandalised and set on fire in his testimony,” the court said.
The case
During the investigation, police arrested three other accused in connection with the case, based on disclosures allegedly made in a separate FIR related to the riots. The police initially registered an FIR under sections 147, 148, 149 and 436 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), relating to rioting, armed rioting, unlawful assembly and mischief by fire. A court, however, declined to take cognisance against them in December 2020.
“Ahmad testified that he had seen a mob vandalise and set fire to the mosque only once during the riots, at around 8pm to 8.15pm,” the court observed, adding that he did not remember the date, but did not support the prosecution’s claim that a second attack took place at around 11am on February 25.
