Journalist Jagendra Singh's murder: Allahabad HC to hear PIL seeking CBI probe in August

Lucknow: The Allahabad High Court on Wednesday fixed first week of August as the next date of hearing on a PIL seeking directions for a CBI probe into the killing of a Shahjahanpur-based journalist.

The date was fixed by a vacation bench of justices Arun Tandon and Anil Kumar after Additional Advocate General Bulbul Godiyal submitted that the matter was pending in the Supreme Court.

The bench said that in view of the submission, list the case in the first week of August.

As per the earlier directive, the progress report in the case was filed on Wednesday, which was taken on record.

The petitioner’s counsel Prince Lenin later alleged that not a single word has been said about the dying declaration in the report.

He alleged that prima facie the investigation was pointing towards suicide theory of journalist.

On 16 July, a vacation division bench of justices Shri Narain Shukla and Pratyush Kumar had directed the UP government to file progress report within one week in the murder of journalist Jagendra Singh.

The court asked government counsel to inform it about the stage of investigation by June 24 along with their objections raised during course of hearing the matter.

The order was issued on the PIL filed by an NGO on 11 June.

The journalist was allegedly set on fire by policemen on 1 June during a raid at his house at Vikas Colony in Sadar Bazar, Shahjahanpur.

Singh died during treatment at a hospital in Lucknow on 8 June.

An FIR was registered against Minister of State for Backward Welfare Ram Murti Singh Verma and five others, including the policemen, at Puwayan Police Station of Shahjahanpur by the victim’s son Raghvendra.

The FIR was lodged under sections 302 (murder), 120 B (criminal conspiracy), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 506 (criminal intimidation).

The journalist had reportedly invited Verma’s ire by posting reports on Facebook about alleged “illegal” mining activities and land grabbing by the minister.

The video footage of the dying declaration that went viral on news channels and social media showed Jagendra Singh saying, “Why did they have to burn me? If the minister and his goons had a grudge, they could have beaten me instead of pouring kerosene and burning me.”

PTI