FIR registered in Karkare’s missing jacket case

SEEKING ACTION: Social activist Santosh Daundkar had given an application to the JJ Marg police asking it to register a theft complaint for Karkare’s missing bullet-proof jacket

Mateen Hafeez I TNN

Mumbai: The JJ Marg police on Tuesday registered a case of theft in connection with the missing bulletproof jacket of anti-terrorism squad’s (ATS) slain chief Hemant Karkare. The police registered the FIR after the Mazgaon court ordered the police to register a case.

Karkare (54), who had earlier spent nine years in research and analysis wing (R&AW), was killed by the terrorists on the night of November 26, 2008. Karkare, who sustained five bullet injuries in a gunbattle with the terrorists, was declared dead when admitted to a hospital. However, the bullet-proof jacket, he was wearing at the time of the encounter, went missing from the JJ Hospital.

A social worker and Mumbai citizen, Santosh Daundkar, on November 15, 2009, gave an application to the JJ Marg police, asking it to register a theft complaint for the missing bullet-proof jacket. The JJ Marg police officers sent the application to higher-ups.

On November 16, R R Patil, who was the home minister of Maharashtra at that time, ordered an investigation into the missing bullet-proof jacket case after Karkare’s widow Kavita brought the matter to his notice.

“We have registered the FIR (under section 379 of the Indian Penal Code for theft) as per the court’s direction and are probing the case,’’ said assistant inspector Santosh Bagwe of the JJ Marg police. The police station is required to submit its report to the magistrate by 30 January, 2010.
Daundkar, in his application, had stated, “It became apparent from the reports in the media that despite the bullet-proof jacket, bullets pierced his (Karkare’s) body. It becomes logically apparent that the jacket failed.’’

Former IPS officer Y P Singh, counsel for Daundkar, stated, “The bullet-proof jacket was purchased by senior officers after committing several illegalities. The sub-standard jackets were returned and supplied to police again.”

The jacket, the application further stated, “was removed in the hospital, following which it went missing”. “First, the jacket was stolen and then the file containing information about the purchase of sub-standard jackets went missing from the police commissioner’s office,’’ said Singh.

The Times of India, December 9, 2009