Gargi college molestation: Delhi High Court to hear plea for CBI probe today

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New Delhi: Delhi High Court will on Monday (February 17) hear the plea seeking court-monitored Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the alleged molestation of students during a cultural festival at the all-women Gargi College on February 6.

The Delhi High Court had on Friday said that it will hear on February 17 advocate ML Sharma's petition seeking a CBI probe in the Gargi college incident. Sharma mentioned his plea before a division bench of Justices GS Sistani and Justice C Hari Shankar seeking an urgent hearing in the matter.

The bench enquired Sharma about the urgency with regard to his plea. He responded by stating that there are chances of destroying evidence related to the case.

The advocate told the court that nothing major has been done so far and an FIR was registered on February 9 following the arrest of 10 people.

Sharma has also sought direction for the CBI investigation into the matter and to seize all video and CCTV records surrounding Gargi campus. The bench asked him to approach the High Court as the Telangana High Court earlier had issued a similar direction to preserve CCTV footage while hearing a gang-rape case in the state.

The petition filed by Sharma claimed that the state government took no action and its clear criminal conspiracy hatched by the political party to deploy mass accused persons to provoke the people of Delhi for effecting voting in their favour.

"Despite being present on spot as well as complaints by the girl students, the college administration under the office of the Principal, took no action on the incident with alleged sexist, homophobic and moral policing comments," the plea read.

The petitioner also said that despite the presence of Delhi Police and reserve Delhi force on the spot on February 6, neither the Principal nor state authorities tried to stop the accused.

In a recent development, one more person was on Sunday arrested in connection with the case. The total number of arrests made by the police in this incident has reached 15. A Delhi court had on Friday granted bail to 10 people, who were arrested in connection to this case.

The Delhi Police had earlier received a complaint from Gargi College against the alleged sexual harassment of female students by a number of unidentified men during their annual cultural fest on February 6.

A case was registered at Hauz Khas Police Station and several teams were constituted to investigate the matter. The police have been looking into available evidence and visited various sites in NCR for the identification of suspects.