CBI court orders 7-yr jail, fine for two policemen in 2009 custodial death

In a rare instance, the special CBI court on Tuesday convicted two police officials for custodial torture following which a detainee died on September 11, 2009.

- Charul Shah Joshi

The two have been sentenced to seven years in jail with a fine of Rs62,000 each, of which Rsl lakh will be paid to deceased Altaf Shaikh's mother.

The two policemen are Sanjay Khedekar, 55, and Raghunath Kolekar, 62. The CBI had also booked a third policeman, Sayaji Thombare, but he died in 2023, pending trial. Khedekar and Kolekar were never arrested after the registration of the case as the charge of Section 330 (voluntarily causing hurt to extort confession or to compel restoration of property) under the Indian Penal code was a bailable offence.

The court acquitted them from the charges of murder, observing that Shaikh's death was natural (respiratory failure due to combined additive effect of toxicity of Alprazolam and ethyl alcohol

and lung pneumonia). However, the court accepted that Shaikh was indeed subjected to assault in custody.