New Delhi, March 31: ALL the five people accused of killing Outlook cartoonist Irfan Hussein to steal his car seven years ago were acquitted by a trial court here today. Additional Sessions Judge Talwant Singh acquitted the accused saying the prosecution had "not been able to link the accused with the commission of crime beyond reasonable doubt".
The case unravelled when key witness Banwari Lal, in whose presence Hussein’s bag had allegedly been recovered from the house of one of the car-jackers, turned hostile.
Police say Mohammad Mustafa Ansari, Heera Singh alias "Bullet", Sanjay Kumar, Mohammad Jaseem and Mohammad Sahid had kidnapped, robbed and murdered Hussein on March 8, 1999. The gangsters, who were arrested in December the same year, were allegedly part of an Udham Singh Nagar-based gang of highway robbers who operated on lonely highway stretches around Delhi and adjoining cities. The gang would then dispose the stolen cars in Kashmir.
The prosecution alleged that the gang spotted Hussein as he drove along the highway near Gazipur Dairy Farm and tried to stop him and rob him. When the cartoonist resisted, the accused reportedly stabbed him 28 times, strangled him, dumped his body and drove off with his vehicle.
Police managed to crack the case only when a car thief Fahim was arrested in Anantnag, Kashmir, and a stolen car recovered from him. The other car-jackers, who were being tried in the court of Metropolitan Magistrate Sanjiv Jain in another car theft case, were arrested on December 14, 1999 for Hussein’s murder.
According to the prosecution, interrogation of the accused led police to the Sonepat house of Sanjay, one of the accused.
Police claim they recovered Hussein’s bag, which he had been carrying in his car when he left home, from Sanjay’s house. The bag, which the prosecution said was recovered in Banwari Lal’s presence, contained the cartoonist’s pen, his diary and his mobile phone charger.
However, in September 2003 in court, Lal denied being present in Sanjay’s house when the bag was recovered. When he was cross-examined and shown his signed statement that supported the prosecution argument, Lal said: "The police made me sign on a blank piece of paper."
The turnaround was enough for the court to dismiss the prosecution’s claim over the recovery of the bag and Hussein’s belongings.
In addition, the way in which the cartoonist’s car was recovered prompted Justice Singh to say the prosecution’s version of events looked like a "scene from a book or a movie".
Sixty-two prosecution witnesses, including Hussein’s wife Muneera, appeared during the course of the trial. Muneera even filed an application with Delhi High Court in August 1999 expressing dissatisfaction over the progress of the probe into the murder. She had sought the transfer of the case to the CBI. Muneera later disputed the police version of events saying Hussein’s murder was more than a highway robbery that ended in murder.
FOUR of the five people accused of killing Irfan Hussein were also charged with murdering two businessmen and stealing their cars.
One of those abducted and murdered was East Delhi businessman Vijay Arora. The businessman was allegedly waylaid by Heera Singh alias "Bullet", Mustafa Ansari, Sanjay Kumar and Mohd Jaseem while driving near Sarai Kale Khan in August 1999. His decomposing body was recovered from a forest stretch in Sarai Kale Khan area; Hussein’s body was found in exactly the same manner.
Arora’s car was traced in Anantnag when an accomplice of the gang, Fahim, tried to sell it off.
Another businessman was allegedly killed and his car stolen by the same gangsters in a similar manner. An FIR was lodged at Hazrat Nizamuddin Police Station. Another murder case, registered at New Friends’ Colony Police Station, mentioned the same four along with two others.
