Hearing begins, 7 witnesses cross examined
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, March 03 2013 : Hearing on six cases of alleged extra judicial killings as ordered by the Supreme Court has begun today at Hotel Classic.

The Commission established under the directive of the Supreme Court (SC) of India on January 4 to conduct inquiry into 6 different cases of alleged extra-judicial killings in Manipur is headed by SC Justice (Retd) N Santosh Hegde as the chairman while former Chief Election Commissioner JM Lyngdoh and retired DGP of Karnataka Police Ajay Kumar Singh are the members.

Seven prosecution witnesses were cross examined today.

JM Lyngdoh and Ajay Kumar were also present during the hearing which started from 9 am and continued up to 6.45 pm.

The cases for which hearing was done today included killing of Md Azad Khan on March 4, 2009, killing of Khumbongmayum Orsonjit on March 16, 2010, killing of Nameirakpam Gobind and Nobo on April 4, 2009, killing of Elangbam Kiranjit on April 24, 2009, killing of Chongtham Umakanta on May 5, 2009 and killing of Akoijam Priyobarta on March 15, 2009 .

Commission members arriving

Seven prosecution witnesses of these six cases were cross-examined by police and Assam Rifles counsels.

The Commission also gave its observations.

The prosecution witnesses were asked by police counsel Dilipkumar Das if they witnessed police shooting/killing their sons which was responded in the negative.

But when the police counsel suggested that the particular persons were killed in retaliatory fire by police, the witnesses were not ready to accept the same suggestion.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Inquiry Commission asked the police counsel to submit post mortem reports as well as ballistic reports of the six particular cases by tomorrow.

Santosh Hegde further instructed the police personnel to get all the accused personnel ready as their hearing would begin tomorrow afternoon.

The AR counsel was also directed to submit all the necessary documents.

It may be recalled here that on February 28 copies of a public notice in this regard dated February 24 issued by PS Moorthy, Secretary, Supreme Court Appointed Commission, were made available to the media during a joint press meet addressed by 13 different NGOs, including the Extrajudicial Execution Victims' Families Association, Manipur (EEVFAM) and Human Rights Alert (HRA) here.

The public notice says after March 5, affidavits will only be received at the Commissioner's office at Imphal, it says, adding it is made clear that any affidavits received beyond the said date will not be taken on record without permission of the Commission.

Urging all concerned to submit affidavits to the Commission, EEVFAM secretary Neena Ningombam had said every individual who wants to file affidavit to the Inquiry Commission will be assisted.

The commission was set up following a recent petition filed by EEVFAM which pleaded for an independent probe into more than 1500 cases of extrajudicial killings in Manipur.