Anushka Sharma –
Published On: November 25, 2021 at 16:55 IST
The Delhi Police told a Delhi Court on Wednesday that suspending real estate barons Sushil and Gopal Ansal’s seven-year Prison sentence for tampering with Evidence in the main Uphaar fire tragedy case would cause Victims mental trauma and agony.
Additional public prosecutor AT Ansari argued before additional sessions Judge Anil Antil that punishing the Ansal brothers would provide solace to the Victims of the fire tragedy and restore their faith in the Justice system, even after 24 years.
“The manner in which the most crucial documents, capable of establishing the involvement of Ansals in the case, were handpicked from the Court records comprising more than 15,000 pages, relevant portion of the documents were torn, obliterated and defaced by sprinkling ink on them, was not a simple air strike; it was a guided missile attack to hit the target,” Ansari told the Court.
He believes that if the sentence is suspended just 15 days after it is handed down, it will further destroy the Public’s faith in the Criminal justice system. He described it as “No less than an assault on the Justice delivery system,” in which the Delhi judiciary’s institutional integrity was questioned.
The hearing relates to tampering with Evidence in the main case on the fire tragedy, which claimed 59 lives, during the screening of the Hindi film ‘Border’ on June 13, 1997.
A Delhi Court on November 8 also handed a seven-year Jail term each to the brothers for tampering with Evidence and noted in the Verdict that their regrets over the incident were ‘Hollow’.
Ansals have asked the Court to stay their punishment while their Appeal is pending, despite the fact that they were recently Convicted and sentenced to Prison by a magisterial Court.
Former Court staff Dinesh Chand Sharma and two others, P P Batra and Anoop Singh, were also sentenced to seven years in Prison and fined Rs 3 lakh each by the Magistrate Court.