CBI moves Kerala high court against discharge of excise preventive officer in Pavaratty custodial death case

Kochi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has filed a criminal revision petition in high court challenging the order of CBI Special Court, Ernakulam, which discharged excise officer M G Anoop Kumar who is the first accused in the Pavaratty custodial death case.The bench of Justice V M Syam Kumar issued notice to Anoop and adjourned the matter to May 29 for further consideration. According to prosecution, while Anoop was serving as an excise preventive officer with the excise enforcement and anti-narcotic special squad, Thrissur, on Oct 1, 2019, one Renjith Kumar was arrested by the squad from Guruvayur for allegedly possessing 1.96kg of ganja. He was subsequently taken to a toddy godown at Pavaratty, where he later died due to alleged custodial torture.The case, initially registered by the Pavaratty police, was later transferred to CBI. Seven excise officers, including Anoop, were arrayed as accused. As per the postmortem report, Renjith had sustained 12 blunt force injuries to the head and trunk, and each of those injuries was, both individually and collectively, sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to cause death. In his discharge petition, Anoop claimed that he was not involved in the alleged torture and had not committed any offence. He argued that the witness statements recorded by the investigating officer and the documents produced by prosecution did not disclose the ingredients of the offences alleged against him. Accepting his contentions, the special court discharged him, observing that there was no material to show that Anoop was aware of the physical torture inflicted on Renjith by the other accused in the toddy godown.However, in its revision petition, CBI alleged that Anoop had manipulated documents, including the recovery mahazar, the arrest memo and the special report, to falsely show that 1.95kg of ganja was recovered from Renjith. The CBI sought to set aside the impugned order of the special court and reinstate Anoop as an accused in the case.