PANAJI
The Additional Sessions Judge, Margao, has directed the Konkan Railway Police to preserve CCTV footage from the police station premises between April 21 and 22, the period when the Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) of Goa Police arrested Police Inspector (PI) Sunil Gudlar and hawaldar Hussain on bribery charges.
The direction on Saturday comes after the now-suspended PI filed an application seeking to preserve the CCTV footage while submitting to the Court that he was patrolling the railway station and was not present at the police station at the time of the raid.
“The Applicant (PI Gudlar) has made an entry in the general diary on April 21 about leaving for patrolling at the Railway Station at about 19:08 hrs, that is prior to the raid being conducted by the ACB,” his lawyer Advocate Galileo Teles, submitted during the hearing on Friday.
Gudlar, who was granted bail on Thursday, had earlier applied to the Public Information Officer (PIO) of the Konkan Railway Police Station (KRPS) for copies of the Station Diary and General Diary entries of April 21 and 22. He also sought video footage from CCTV cameras covering the ground floor and outside areas of the Margao station from 6 pm on April 21 to 2 pm the next day.
Teles informed the court that the PI had received a reply dated April 29 from the PIO-cum-Deputy Superintendent of Police, Margao, denying access to the footage because it might impede the investigation or prosecution process.
He countered that the post-trap panchanama was drawn in Gudlar’s presence on April 21 and had already been transcribed. He contended that furnishing the footage would not prejudice the Investigating Officer, especially since the PI was part of the panchanama proceedings.
“Even otherwise the CCTV footage of any Police Station is a matter of public record and should be given to the Applicant and more particularly preserved in the present case since Applicant has been falsely implicated by arresting the Applicant outside the KRPS at Margao from Platform No. 6 of Konkan Railway Station at Margao and later brought back to the KRPS,” the advocate argued.
The application also stated that the station diary entries and CCTV recordings from the entry/exit points and the ACB’s office were crucial to establish the sequence of events and ensure that the applicant is not wrongly framed.
Taking the arguments into account, the court ordered the DySP of KRPS to preserve CCTV footage from all cameras on the ground floor and the outside areas of the PS between 6 pm on April 21 and 2 pm on April 22, until the filing of the final report in the case. The application is now adjourned for next hearing in June.
Gudlar, who was arrested on April 21, was suspended following allegations that he was involved in a bribe demand made to a meat trader from Belgaum. According to the complaint, suspended hawaldar Hussain allegedly demanded a bribe of Rs 2 lakh to close a criminal case related to the seizure of bovine meat. It was further alleged that the demand was made on behalf of Gudlar and that the complainant was asked to pay Rs 25,000 monthly to continue his business without interference.
