Thieves become 'lawful' owners of stolen car

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">FARIDKOT: In a classic case of duping a court, while a car thief succeeded in taking custody of the stolen Tata Qualis in a ''lawful'' manner, the real owner of the vehicle was left dumbfounded when the court declined him the custody of the car. <br /><br />Faridkot Police have registered criminal case against head munshi of city police station Kotkapura, the thief and one of his brother for the offence of forgery and cheating on Thursday after an inquiry by SP(D) Faridkot.<br /><br />According to the FIR registered by the Kotkapura police on Thursday, a Tata Qualis car was found abandoned near New Grain Market Kotkapura on August 14, 2003. The verification of the documents of the car revealed it belonging to Rahim Mohammad Hanif of Sholapur (Maharastra). <br /><br />The Kotkapura police contacted Sholapur police and came to know that the car was stolen from Bijapur and a case of theft was registered at Bijapur police station against one Sukhminder Singh of Deep Singh Wala village in Faridkot District. <br /><br />Kotkapura police informed the owner telephonically and Hanif reached Faridkot and moved an application in the court of additional chief judicial magistrate Faridkot to get the custody of vehicle on November 20, 2003. The ACJM sent the application to Kotkapura police for verification of ownership. Head munshi Baljeet Singh, at the police station, made a report that Hanif was the real owner. <br /><br /><formid=367815><br /><br /></formid=367815></div> </div><div class="section2"><div class="Normal"><br />Despite this report, the ACJM declined to give custody of the car to Hanif and the latter filed a revision petition before the court of additional district and session judge (ADJ) Faridkot against ACJM’s order. The ADJ accepted the revision petition on February 21, 2004 and ordered the custody of the car be given to Hanif. <br /><br />But when Hanif approached Kotkapura police for the car''s custody, he was astonished to know that the car had already been given in custody to Sukhvinder Singh (the car thief) on ACJM’s orders. <br /><br />Puzzled Hanif again reached the court of ACJM and came to know that at the time he was proceeding his revised petition in ADJ''s court, Sukhvinder had moved an application for the custody of the car in the court of ACJM on February 20. On Sukhvinder''s application, the ACJM again sought report from Kotkapura police for ownership verification and same head munshi Baljeet Singh made a report in favour of Sukhvidner, establishing him as owner. <br /><br />Interestingly, this time the ACJM had allowed the custody of the car to Sukhminder Singh on February 21. Hanif brought the matter in the notice of SSP Faridkot who got the matter investigated by SP (D) Vijay Sharma. In his investigation report, submitted on Feb 3, the SP(D) held that the head munshi Baljeet Singh, the car thief Sukhvinder Singh and his brother Jaswant Singh acted to get the custody of the vehicle. <br /><br />Kulchhinder Singh, SSP Faridkot ordered registration of a case of cheating and forgery against Baljeet, Sukhvinder and Jaswant Singh and ordered to place the head munshi under suspension. <br /><br /><formid=367815></formid=367815></div> </div>