‘No malafide intention’: Gurugram police chief concedes ‘lapses’ before SC in Delhi man’s cremation

Gurugram Commissioner of Police (CP) Sibash Kabiraj has “conceded” that the local police committed “procedural lapses” while handling the unidentified body of Delhi-based real estate professional Yuvraj Manchanda who was allegedly killed by his former colleague and her partner last month, The Indian Express has learnt.

A compliance affidavit, filed in the Supreme Court on October 1, has the Gurugram CP tendering an “unqualified apology for the lapses”.

The affidavit acknowledged that supervisory reviews had found that information regarding the unidentified body “was not entered promptly in CCTNS form IIF-10,” that “intimation was not given to the Executive Magistrate within 24 hours” and that the control room in-charge was “negligent in performance of her duties for having relayed the information with regards to the discovery of the dead body only to local police stations and not to adjoining states”.

The police chief, however, maintained that there was “no malafide intention involved on the part of the local police”.

Sequence of events per affidavit

Police said a PCR call was received around 4:05 pm on September 10 regarding a body lying in a waterlogged open field near a drain in Sector 70. According to the police, a team of officers reached the spot to find that the body was “bloated” and “decomposed”, “rendering fingerprint collection impossible and detailed on-site examination for external injuries infeasible”.

The body was shifted to a mortuary, and following an autopsy on September 14, it was cremated as an “unidentified individual” at Ram Bagh Crematorium, police said.

According to the affidavit, officers at Badshahpur police station uploaded a recovery entry on the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS) form, IIF-10, only on September 15, a day after the cremation.

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An order dated September 17, issued by Deputy Commissioner of Police (Headquarters) Dr Anshu Singla, placed investigating officer ASI Sahun Khan under immediate suspension and ordered a joint regular departmental enquiry against him and Badshahpur police station SHO Rajesh Kumar.

The order observed that ASI Khan made “no effective efforts” to establish the identity of the deceased, failed to publish an advertisement in local newspapers, omitted uploading details onto the Zonal Integrated Police Network (ZIPNET) portal, and failed to record complete particulars in CCTNS Forms IIF-10 and IIF-11, police said.

The DCP Headquarters noted that an abduction case had already been registered at Lajpat Nagar police station, Delhi, remarking that “had the information regarding the unidentified dead body been uploaded on the ZIPNET portal in accordance with the prescribed procedure, there was a possibility of establishing the identity of the deceased”.

Inspector Kumar was deemed prima facie liable for “gross negligence” for failing to visit the spot, inspect the body and supervise formalities. ASI Khan was directed to deposit arms and ammunition with him and restricted to subsistence allowance.

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A second departmental enquiry against both officers was initiated via an order dated September 30, also issued by Dr Singla. This order cited a report by the Assistant Commissioner of Police, Badshahpur, that had found that both the SHO and the IO “failed to call/seek the presence of the Executive Magistrate at the spot,” in direct violation of BNSS Section 194 as well as the police commissionerate’s Standard Operating Procedure.

Through a communication dated September 18, the DCP Headquarters recommended departmental action to the Superintendent of Police, Telecommunication (H), against ESI Hasina, who was on duty as Control Room In-charge on September 10. It recorded that she “failed to convey the said information regarding the recovery of the unidentified dead body to the concerned/nearest districts and neighbouring States”.

Following these lapses, the Gurugram Police Commissioner issued fresh instructions on September 28, mandating that control room personnel must immediately flash particulars of every unidentified body to adjoining districts and neighbouring states.

Differences between affidavits

Meanwhile, a comparative analysis of affidavits filed by Delhi CP Anurag Kumar (dated October 3) and his Gurugram counterpart reveals some differences in the accounts.

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CP Kabiraj asserted that on September 15, the Delhi Police approached the district police regarding the FIR concerned, and “on their request, the entire case property and the documentation was handed over to them”.

The Delhi Police affidavit, however, stated that its officers were tracking the suspects in Uttarakhand during September 15-16, arrested them on September 17, and only discovered the recovery and cremation of the body on September 18 while inspecting the drain in Gurugram.

While the Gurugram police chief claimed that all records were handed over on September 15, Delhi Police documented that inquest papers and the post-mortem report were produced at Lajpat Nagar police station only on September 21.

Emphasising the operational fallout of Gurugram’s omissions, the Delhi CP Anurag Kumar submitted that “the efficacy of ZIPNet and CCTNS in matching missing persons with unidentified dead bodies depends upon the contemporaneous uploading of both by every participating police unit, and upon a cross-search of these databases before an unidentified dead body is disposed of”.