Murthal rape case SIT “pre-determined to sanitise evidence”, Amicus Curie tells High Court
A blistering court filing accuses Haryana’s SIT of suppressing witnesses, ignoring its own evidence, and defying a High Court finding — ten years after women were allegedly assaulted during the Jat reservation agitation
BACKGROUND
In February 2016, during the Jat reservation agitation that convulsed Haryana, multiple women alleged they were raped near Murthal on the GT Road in Sonepat district. The Tribune newspaper first reported the story on February 24, 2016, prompting two judges of the Punjab and Haryana High Court to take suo motu cognizance. An SIT headed by IGP Mamta Singh was constituted to investigate. In December 2017, the SIT filed its final report concluding that no rape had been committed. The case has remained before the High Court ever since.
THE FILING
In a sharply-worded response to the State of Haryana’s synopsis filed before the Punjab and Haryana High Court, amicus curiae Anupam Gupta has accused the SIT of conducting a “pre-conceived and pre-determined” investigation, designed to sanitise all material evidence and arrive at a predetermined conclusion that no rape occurred at Murthal.
The document directly challenges the State’s claim that the SIT’s work was “thorough, fair and professional,” citing multiple instances where witness statements were allegedly suppressed, court orders ignored, and evidence either misrepresented or omitted from the SIT’s final report.
THE COURT’S OWN FINDING IGNORED
Central to the amicus’s challenge is the High Court’s own order of January 19, 2017, which expressly held that “the offence of rape had been committed” — based on eyewitness statements and forensic evidence of human semen found on seized undergarments. The SIT’s final report, the amicus argues, not only ignores this judicial finding but actively works to negate it.
The SIT’s final report makes no mention whatsoever of the statement of Raj Kumar son of Kallu Ram — a witness expressly relied upon by the High Court. The amicus submits it was not open to the SIT to act as if this statement “does not exist or matter at all.”
THE AMRIK SINGH DISCREPANCY
Perhaps the most striking revelation concerns Amrik Singh, owner of Sukhdev Dhaba at Murthal — a key source cited by The Tribune. While the SIT’s final report states he “categorically denied” seeing any rape victim, the SIT’s own case diary tells a far more complicated story.
Pages 1326–1327 of the SIT’s consolidated case diary record Amrik Singh telling investigators that he had himself told Tribune reporters that rape had “perhaps” taken place, and that given the atmosphere at the time, “ho gaya hoga” — it may well have happened.
The amicus submits: “The SIT has been less than honest to this Hon’ble Court in reporting what Amrik Singh said. A single-line assertion constitutes a material and wilful misrepresentation.”
THE TWO WEEPING GIRLS — SUPPRESSED ENTIRELY
Statements recorded from Tara Devi, Sunil Garg and Krishan Jain describe two young women aged 20–21 arriving at a dharamshala on February 21, 2016, weeping uncontrollably and saying: “hamare saath jo hua hai, nahi hona chahiye tha” — what happened to us should not have happened.
Not a word about these two women appears in the SIT’s final report. The amicus asks plainly: “What exactly was the SIT looking into or looking at, if not misbehaviour with women?”
CUT-AND-PASTE STATEMENTS
The amicus flags that 54 statements recorded on a single day from employees of establishments along the GT Road, and 18 more from dhaba workers near Murthal, are virtually identical to one another — a wholesale cut-and-paste exercise that throws the bona fides of the entire SIT investigation into serious doubt.
THE ROHTAK FAILURE AND PRAKASH SINGH COMMITTEE
The response also takes the State to task for its complete silence on the Prakash Singh Committee Report — a comprehensive inquiry into the February 2016 agitation that the High Court had described as indicting “the State machinery of complete failure.” The Committee recorded that 30 lives were lost, property worth Rs. 20,000 crores was destroyed, police disappeared from the streets, and fire brigades refused to respond for days.
The amicus notes that the SIT claims to have found “no clue” in 1,088 of 1,205 cases registered in Rohtak district — a claim it says is impossible to reconcile with the Prakash Singh Committee’s exhaustive factual record of the violence.
WHAT THE AMICUS IS ASKING FOR
The amicus urges the High Court to transfer the Murthal rape case to the CBI for fresh investigation — though he concedes that with nearly ten years having elapsed since the incidents, even the CBI may struggle to achieve anything substantial at this distance of time.
