3 CRPF jawans get life term for killing Tripura policeman

Agartala, Apr 4 (UNI) The Guwahati High Court, Agartala has sentenced three Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel to life imprisonment for killing a state Police constable 12 years back.

A division bench of the High Court yesterday upheld the judgement of a lower court, which had earlier sentenced the jawans of 97th Battalion - Rambir Singh of Uttar Pradesh, Rajkumar Singh of Haryana and Badmani Mishra of Madhya Pradesh to life imprisonment.

The trio had killed a state Police constable, who prevented them from entering an auditorium to watch a function on July 8, 1996 at Dharmanagar, North Tripura.

As the jawans were outnumbered, they returned to barrack and came to the auditorium with arms and opened fire on the security personnel, resulting in death of a constable- Sukumar Ghosh died on the spot.

After a prolong hearing, four CRPF personnel- including the above three and Somnath Singh were found guilty in the killing by a local court of Dharmanagar.

However, Somnath was acquitted by the High Court later on the ground of lack of evidence. All the other theree convicted had filed a petition before the Division Bench of Guwahati High Court challenging the verdict of the lower court.

UNI BB LL GL VC1130