Delhi police seek time to probe doctor`s death

The Delhi police sought two months time from a court here to re-investigate the death of a doctor whose body was found in an ambulance parked in the nursing home of another doctor who is accused in the case.

New Delhi: The Delhi police on Wednesday sought two months time from a court here to re-investigate the death of a doctor whose body was found in an ambulance parked in the nursing home of another doctor who is accused in the case.

The cops` response came on a magisterial court`s earlier direction asking the Delhi Police Commissioner to submit before it the compliance report in the matter, after District Judge RK Gauba had ordered a fresh probe into the death of private practitioner Akchad Biswas. Biswas` body was found in an ambulance in the premises of Ajit Gupta`s nursing home in Malviya Nagar in south Delhi on the intervening night of January 27-28, 2006. Metropolitan Magistrate Chetna Singh, to whom the case was sent by the District Judge to examine the lapses in police probe, had asked the police to submit the compliance report on the district judge`s order and directed Gupta and his four employees to remain present before it in person. Apart from the accused, an Investigating Officer (IO) on behalf of the Police Commissioner today appeared in the matter and told the court that it needs two months time to re-investigate the case as they have to visit the native place of the victim. "I have to re-investigate the matter from initial stage. I need to get into the root of the alleged incident and also the crime," the IO told the court. The court allowed the IO`s request and asked him to file the complete report of the investigation by May 28, the next date of hearing in the case. The District Judge had directed re-investigation on the plea of the victim`s wife who had alleged that it was a case of murder and not death due to negligence as concluded by the police. Gupta, who runs the nursing home, had invited Biswas for the annual day party but two days later he informed the victim`s wife about her husband`s death. The victim`s wife, complainant in the case, has been seeking prosecution of all five for the alleged murder of her husband. The district judge`s order had come a year after a magisterial court in November 2011 discharged Gupta and four other accused in the case for lack of evidence. The victim`s wife had challenged the magistrate`s order. In her plea, the victim`s wife had alleged she had told police that the nursing home owner and others had murdered her husband. Police had registered a murder case but sent the body to her residence in West Bengal without conducting any post-mortem, she added. She had claimed before the district judge that the accused had forged her signature on a letter which stated that she was willing to take her husband`s body to her native place. The body was sent without post-mortem as police found nothing amiss saying her husband died of injuries from a fall after consuming excessive alcohol, she said. The post-mortem conducted by West Bengal police had termed the death as homicidal. PTI