Protect Kheri witnesses: Supreme Court to UP government

The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the UP government to protect witnesses in the Lakhimpur Kheri case, where a convoy of BJP leaders led by Ashish Mishra, son of Union minister of state for home Ajay Mishra, allegedly mowed down farmers.

Hearing a plea challenging grant of bail for Mishra by the Allahabad high court, a three-judge bench of chief justice NV Ramana and justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli asked the state government to elaborate steps taken to ensure safety of witness, before March 24, when the case will be heard next. HC granted Mishra bail 34 days ago, after a sessions judge denied him bail. The state will also have to say why the bail should not be cancelled. It had not appealed against the grant of bail.

The families of the victims said that the HC decision violated all established principles for granting bail. Appearing for the families, senior advocate Dushyant Dave and advocate Prashant Bhushan said that the HC ignored the fact that SC had taken suo motu cognisance of the case and upgraded the SIT set up by the state to probe the incident. That charge sheet, which the families say pinned down the accused, was never presented in the HC, Dave contended, while drawing the court's attention to a recent attack on one of the witnesses. "This is very serious."


The bench asked the state, represented by advocate Ruchira Goel, to ensure that witnesses were protected. The families also claimed that their counsel was disconnected during the hearing and was not given an effective chance to argue the case. The three who challenged Ashish Mishra's bail are Jagjeet Singh (he lost his farmer brother), Pawan Kashyap (who lost his journalist brother) and Sukhvinder Singh (who lost his son Gurvinder Singh). Eight persons were killed in the incident, some in retaliatory violence.