Delhi violence: HC asks hospitals to take videos of autopsies, preserve DNA samples of deceased

New Delhi, Mar 06: The high court on Friday directed all the hospitals to videograph post-mortems of those killed during the communal violence in northeast Delhi last week.

A bench of Justices Siddharth Mridul and I S Mehta directed the authorities to preserve the DNA samples of all the bodies and not dispose of any unidentified body till Wednesday, the next date of hearing.

The directions came while hearing a habeas corpus plea by a man seeking the whereabouts of his brother-in-law who went missing during the riots over the amended citizenship law.

During the hearing, the court was informed by the police that the body of the missing person, Hamza, was recovered from a drain at Gokulpuri on Monday and his post-mortem would be conducted during the day at the RML Hospital.

The High Court on Friday also sought responses from the Delhi government and the police on a PIL by CPI(M) leader Brinda Karat seeking directions to make public the list of persons arrested in connection with the recent violence.

A bench of Chief Justice D N Patel ad Justice C Hari Shankar issued notice to the Delhi government and the police on Karat's plea which has sought that a list of the arrested persons be put up outside the police control room and police stations in the district and updated on a case-by-case basis.

It also urged the court to call for a status report containing the names and numbers of the persons detained and arrested by the Delhi Police in relation to the violence that killed at least 44 people and left around 200 injured.

The court on Friday also listed the pleas on violence in northeast Delhi and hate speeches by political leaders on March 12.