Allahabad encounter: CID not to rely on video footage alone

Lucknow, Aug 17 (UNI) Uttar Pradesh police today made it clear that it would not depend solely on the video footage being shown on various news channels while probing into the encounter of criminal Pintoo Mishra which had taken place in Allahabad on September 18, 2006.

A team of CB-CID, the investigatng agency, would reach Allahabad tomorrow to start the probe ordered by Chief Minister Mayawati a couple of days back. The incident had come to light after several news channels had shown the 'live' encounter through a video coverage from the spot.

CB-CID, Director General Harmol Singh told UNI that the probe would not be based on video footage alone the all the facts leading to the encounter would be taken into account. ''Video footage will also be studied but that would not be the only testimony of the events as far as the probe in totality is concerned,'' he said.

The statement of Mr Singh assumes significance in view of the fact that the footage used by different channels, though originating from the same incident, had different perspectives on the encounter.

The criminal was shot dead by the police in broad daylight while on the run after killing a police constable Ashok Pandey with a crude bomb.

According to a section of police, the video coverage shown on some of the channles was ''misleading, incomplete and edited and did not present a true picture of the chain of incidents which led to the encounter.'' ''The criminal was not as helpless as shown in the 'edited' version of the video,'' they claimed. On the other hand some believed it to be a 'fake' encounter.

The probe report is to be submitted to the chief minister within a month, the official sources said.

UNI