Darivit murder case: Calcutta HC asks top Bengal bureaucrats & cop to appear in court

A single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court, on Friday, directed West Bengal Chief Secretary B.P. Gopalika, state Home Secretary Nandini Chakraborty and Additional Director General of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) Dr R. Rajasekaran to appear before it in the murder case of Tapas Burman and Rajesh Sarkar, former students of Darivit High School in North Dinajpur district.

The two were found dead on September 20, 2018, within the school compound.

The single-judge bench of Justice Rajasekhar Mantha clearly ordered that the top bureaucrats and the top cop will have to be present in front of his bench on April 15 by 10.30 a.m. failing which the court will order the issue of an arrest warrant against them.

“In such a case, the arrest warrant would have been issued already. But this court wants to give another chance in this case,” he said.

On Friday, Justice Mantha expressed ire over the reluctance of the Chief Secretary to be even present online at the court. “The Chief Secretary did not even feel the necessity for an online appearance. They are yet to be excused by the court from appearing. Even they had not submitted any application for being excused for appearance,” Justice Mantha observed.

Earlier this month, the Calcutta High Court’s division bench of Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharya had upheld an earlier order by Justice Mantha for the National Investigation Agency (NIA) probe in the matter of Darivit killings.

Justice Mantha issued a “contempt of court” rule against the Chief Secretary, state Home Secretary and ADG (CID) for non-compliance with the order by his bench in May 2023 for the handover of investigation to NIA and paying compensation to the families of victims.