IC-814 convicts seek more security during transit remand

The two were arrested by the Mumbai Police on December 30, 1999 for allegedly robbing a car and then using it for carrying out a dacoity in a bank in Borivli. The police had also recovered $6,000, two AK-56 assault rifles, seven grenades and four rocket launchers from five accused at the time of their arrest.

They were later brought to Patiala after the CBI took them into custody and presented them before a special court as accused in the IC-814 plane hijack case and have been lodged in the Central Jail here since then.

In a petition filed by them before the Patiala Sessions Judge through their counsel Baljinder Singh Sodhi, the two have sought tight security measures during their trial and transit in Mumbai.

With apprehensions that they might be framed in false cases or be eliminated in a fake encounter at the hands of the Mumbai Police, the two convicts have sought that their security be handled by a gazetted-rank police officer and they be handcuffed during their transit.

The Mumbai Police had got their production warrants for initiating trial in the Borivli bank dacoity case and the Patiala Central Jail authorities have sought the state Government’s permission for moving them to Mumbai.

Their counsel Sodhi said since the two were detained under Section 268 CrPC — being conspirators in the hijacking case — they could not be taken out of the high-security Patiala Central Jail without the state Government’s permission.