‘Mercifully you didn’t challan rainwater’

A police personnel interacts with students during a protest over the deaths of three civil services aspirants due to drowning at a coaching centre. File pic/PTI

The Delhi High Court on Friday transferred the probe into the drowning of three civil services aspirants at the basement of a coaching centre in Rajinder Nagar here to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). A bench headed by Acting Chief Justice Manmohan asked the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) to appoint a senior officer to oversee the probe by the CBI in the criminal case.

The court castigated the police and Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) over the drowning incident, saying it was unable to fathom how the students could not come out. It asked why MCD officials did not inform the commissioner about non-functioning stormwater drains in the area. The bench, also comprising Justice Tushar Rao Gedela, said MCD officials are not bothered and it has become a norm.

Hitting out at the police, the high court said, "Mercifully, you have not challaned rainwater for entering into the basement, the way you arrested the SUV driver for driving his car there." Manuj Kathuria was accused of driving his SUV through the street that was flooded by rainwater on July 27, causing the water to swell and breach the gates of the three-storey building housing the coaching centre and inundate the basement, where the three students were killed.

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