NEW DELHI: A Delhi court has convicted five men for rioting and assaulting police personnel during violence at a Bhajanpura petrol pump in the 2020 northeast Delhi riots, while acquitting them of the charge of setting the fuel station on fire.Additional Sessions Judge Parveen Singh, hearing the case against Arif, Mohd Khalid, Abdul Sattar, Tanveer Ali and Hunain, said the prosecution had proved that the five were part of an unlawful assembly that attacked police personnel on duty.In an order dated September 9, the court said, “This unlawful assembly attacked them by pelting stones upon them and ferocity of the attack was such that the police officials fled from the petrol pump by jumping over its wall, and used criminal force upon the public servants and obstructed them in discharge of their duty”.The five were convicted under Sections 147 (rioting), 152 (assaulting or obstructing a public servant suppressing a riot), 186 (obstructing a public servant in discharge of duty) and 353 (assault or criminal force to deter a public servant), all read with Section 149 of the IPC relating to unlawful assembly.The question of sentence will be argued separately.According to the prosecution, police received a call around 2pm on February 24, 2020, about a large mob gathering at the Bhajanpura petrol pump, also known as Delhi Diesels, on the Yamuna Vihar service road.Police personnel who reached the spot found 100 to 150 people who had crossed over from the Chand Bagh side after breaking a road divider. The mob was allegedly raising slogans against the amended citizenship law.The prosecution said the mob then turned violent, pelting stones, vandalising the petrol pump’s machines, torching vehicles parked nearby and assaulting policemen, who were forced to flee by scaling the compound wall.The prosecution examined 26 witnesses. The court relied on the testimony of eight of them, including five police witnesses and an employee of the petrol pump, saying their accounts of the mob’s movement and conduct were mutually consistent and corroborated each other.The court also rejected the defence argument that the same witnesses had been disbelieved in a related case.It noted that the discrepancy in that case related to an earlier time frame and said the Latin maxim “false in one thing, false in everything” has no application in Indian law.The court held that the assembly had gathered with the common object of committing riot, arson and vandalism and therefore constituted an unlawful assembly under Section 141 IPC. Its members were consequently liable under Section 149 IPC for offences committed in furtherance of that common object.“It also stands proved that the unlawful assembly had voluntarily obstructed the police officials who were public servants discharging their duty. At the same time, by pelting stones upon them, this unlawful assembly had used criminal force upon them in order to prevent them from discharging their duty which was maintaining the law and order,” the judge said.However, the court acquitted the five of the arson charge, finding “very serious doubts” over the prosecution’s claim that the mob had set the petrol pump on fire.The court noted that no witness described any major fire or explosion consistent with a working petrol pump catching fire. The owner of the petrol pump and an employee, both examined as prosecution witnesses, also did not support this part of the case.The court further noted a Delhi Fire Service record showing that a call regarding a fire at the petrol pump was received at 8.45am the following day.It said the prosecution had withheld the record from the case without any explanation, observing that it “raises serious questions” about the prosecution’s conduct.The court also acquitted the accused of charges of causing hurt to several injured witnesses, observing that the timelines of their injuries did not match the period during which the mob was active at the petrol pump.They were further acquitted of the charge under Section 188 IPC for violating prohibitory orders, as the prosecution had failed to establish that the order had been adequately publicised.The violence at Bhajanpura was part of the wider northeast Delhi riots that broke out on February 24-25, 2020, amid protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. The violence left 53 people dead and hundreds injured.(With Agency Inputs)
