A Delhi court has rejected the bail pleas of an SUV driver and four owners of a coaching centre’s basement in Old Rajinder Nagar, where three civil services aspirants died last week. Judicial Magistrate Vinod Kumar dismissed the bail applications of Manuj Kathuria, the SUV driver, and basement owners Tejinder Singh, Parvinder Singh, Harvinder Singh, and Sarabjeet Singh.
The incident occurred on the evening of July 27 when Shreya Yadav from Ambedkar Nagar in Uttar Pradesh, Tanya Soni from Telangana, and Navin Dalwin from Ernakulam in Kerala were trapped inside the library of Rau’s IAS Study Circle. The basement library flooded due to heavy rains, leading to the deaths of the three aspirants.
In response to the incident, civil services aspirants from various coaching centres have been staging a protest in front of Rau’s Study Circle since Sunday. Some students have even begun a hunger strike against the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to demand accountability and improvements in infrastructure.
So far, the Delhi Police have arrested seven people in connection with the case. These include the CEO-owner of Rau’s IAS Study Circle, the centre’s coordinator, the four basement owners, and the SUV driver, Manuj Kathuria. Kathuria is accused of driving his Force Gurkha SUV through a flooded street, which allegedly caused rainwater to breach the gates of the three-storey coaching centre, leading to the basement’s inundation. The four co-owners are charged with abetting the offences.
Manuj Kathuria’s wife, Shima Kathuria, expressed her family’s disappointment over the bail rejection. “We are very disappointed that the bail application has been rejected. We were very hopeful that Manuj would come back home tonight, but he will have to spend another night in jail without any fault,” Shima Kathuria said. She added that the High Court Judge mentioned the arrest of a passerby multiple times and expressed hope for eventual justice.
Earlier today, the Delhi High Court criticised the Delhi police’s investigation into the case. The court called the incident a case of “criminal neglect” and an “infrastructure breakdown at the larger level,” deeming the police’s investigation “strange.” The court pointed out that while action was being taken against a passerby and driver Kathuria, no MCD officials had been investigated or held accountable.
The court questioned why only one MCD official had been arrested and urged the investigating officers to scrutinize the role of the MCD in the incident.
“There is some sort of strange investigation going on. It is being done in a very strange manner. No MCD officials have been hauled up till now. Has the investigating officer investigated the role of the MCD officer? How come there was so much water over there? Only one person has gone to jail from MCD. Delhi police have arrested a bystander, a driver who was driving a car there. It seems someone has lost it. The police officers who are investigating the same, what are they doing?” the bench stated.
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