Santosh was injured and was still alive, revealed his intention to fabricate the story of an encounter, which he subsequently carried out. Shri Santosh Kumar had no previous criminal record whatsoever. FIR of case crime Nal3WB8 d o 3991 4021 353 3071 34 IPC and 26 (2b) 1 27 registered by the officer in dmrge Mukhlal Paswan at his PS Barhara on 12 December 1998 was based on facts found unverified by the report of Shri S.V.M. Tripathi. The recovery of a country-made pistol with blank and live cartridges from Santosh Kumar was found to be false from the stakment of fhe witnema of the recovery memorandum, namely V.N. Jha, Deepak Kumar Thakur and Ravindgr k m a r Thakur made befom Shri Tripathi. They flatly denied any such recovery. It was thus reasonable to suspect that the story of the recovery of the pistol was a planted one. Shrl Vivekanand Jha, Deepak Kumar Thakur and Ravinder KurnarThakur were forcibly taken to Purnea by the police party and kept in illegal custody at PS Krityanand.Their statement that they were forced to sign some blank papera while they were in custody, appeared credible enough considering all the facts and circumstances of this case. The conduct of the Purnea police lacked humanity in witholding from the next of kin of the deceased the information about the condition and whereabouts of Santosh Kumar. It was also proved with suffkient clarity that the deceased was not provided immediate medical aid after he was injured-Thedenial of water to him despite his repeated pleas was a disturbing instance of police insensitivity as was their decision to get the body cremated at Purnea itself, denying his mother, wife and grandfather the solace of having a last glimpse of the deceased. Keeping the PS Bihariganj in the dark about the raid on a village in its area of jurisdiction was a violation of a well-established police procedure by the police of district Purnea, which deserved to be viewed with seriousness. Shri Tripathi's report offered sufficient material to suspect the connivance of Shri R.S. Bhati, Supdt. of Police, Purnea in the concoction of evidence to cover up the killing of Santosh Kumar.The Special Report meant for the DIG Range and other superior officers, which was required to be sent at the earliest after the registration of the case, was sent after a lapse of 14 days on 26 December 1998. It contained just a copy of the FIR with the remark that the DSP, Mohd Asghar Imam, would supervise this case. The Supdt. of Police did not mention whether Shri Imam had, by then, even visited the spot and supervised the investigation of this case, which had been registered a fortnight earlier. In fact, he was expected to report on the quality and usefulness of the DSP's supervision, which he totally ignored. The Supdt. of Police admitted that he himself