SC orders judicial probe into dead man walking

The Supreme Court on Friday ordered a judicial inquiry into the unusual case of a ‘murdered man’ walking back home in Uttar Pradesh, for which three persons had been convicted, sentenced to life imprisonment and forced to spend 11 years in jail before getting bail from the apex court.
A bench of Justices R M Lodha and H L Gokhale said it was shocked by the attempt of the Jhansi deputy superintendent of police to defend conviction of the three accused persons and pointed out several flaws in the affidavit before saying, “It is a shocking way of dealing with the case.”
It asked the Jhansi sessions judge to commence inquiry from January 24 into the alleged return of the “murdered” person and submit a report to the apex court in three months. It also said the order granting bail to the three accused would remain in force till further orders.
Senior advocate Ratnakar Das, who appeared for the state, attempted to give a new twist to the case in which the “murdered” Bhagwan Dass, son of Ratnakar Dass, came back home 11 years after the alleged killing.
The advocate said both – the murdered man and the one who returned -- bore the same name Bhagwan Dass and were, in fact, step brothers born to Ratnakar Dass who had remarried after the death of his first wife. The story did not pass muster with the bench, which asked, “Tell us which father would christen both his sons with identical names.”