Bathinda military station firing: No headway so far, eyewitness' version under scanner

Chandigarh: Even as there was no headway in the Wednesday’s case of killing of four Army jawans at Punjab’s Bathinda Military station, the investigators were on Thursday reportedly zeroing in on some holes in the sole eyewitness’ account of the incident.

The dastardly act of jawans’ killing in the wee hours was followed by another incident in which another soldier had died of gunshot in the same military station in the evening, though the police and Army maintained there was no connection between the two cases.

Conspicuously, a soldier, identified as Laghu Raj Shankar, had died of a gunshot around 4.30 pm on Wednesday at Bathinda Military station while he was on sentry duty with his service weapon. The weapon and the cartridge case from the same weapon was found near him and the gunshot wound was near the right temporal side, police said.

Opining that it could be a case of accidental firing or suicide, senior army and police officials held that there was, however, no connection between the two incidents. Laghu Raj Shankar had returned from leave on April 11, police said and added that this incident took place after over 12 hours after the incident of killing of the four jawans.

Post mortem of soldiers raises doubts

Meanwhile, the police investigating team on Thursday raised doubts after the post mortem of the four jawans, in the eye-witness’ account upon which, Major Ashutosh Shukla had lodged the first information report (FIR) with the police.

They held that as per the FIR, a gunner Demai Mohan, who was on duty, had held that he had spotted two masked men in kurta pyjama carrying an Insas rifle and an axe, after the firing incident. He subsequently informed Maj Shukla who lodged the FIR.

Mohan, sources in police said, had told Maj Shukla that the two had melted in the darkness into the forests of the army station.

Eyewitness’ version raises suspicion

According to media reports, Additional director general of police (ADGP), Bathinda range, S P S Parmar, said that the eye-witness’ version raised suspicion as no sharp-edged weapon injuries were found in the soldiers’ bodies in the post mortem and there were only injuries of gunshots. Also, except for the eye-witness, no other person on duty in the entire area had spotted the movement of two men in civvies.

Moreover, sources held that it appeared to be a targeted killing – though a motive behind the same was yet to be ascertained – as there would have been an indiscriminate firing in case of a terror attack.