‘God sees truth, but waits’, even by Leo Tolstoy’s dictum, justice has waited too long for Bitta Karate

Jammu : Rarely in the history of criminal justice would an accused have publicly confessed to having murdered over two dozen human beings brutally and still the prosecution should have failed to put together enough evidence for his conviction.

Even more rare must be the fact that the presiding judge was forced to say that there has been total ‘disinterest’ on part of the prosecution to put up evidence against the accused of such heinous crimes.

These facts stand out to prove that despite having remained in jail for 16 years, the self-confessed butcher of the minority Pandit community, Farooq Ahmad Dar a.k.a. Bitta Karate had ridiculed the prosecution in its face.

Bitta Karate had fired at a border security force (BSF) vehicle on March 5, 1990 killing a civilian and injuring the BSF troopers. Earlier to this, on February 2, 1990, Karate had killed a local Pandit, Satish Tickoo in Habba Kadal area of Srinagar.

It was this case in which the damning words of the judge came down heavily on the prosecution. How serious had the investigation agency been at that time is proved by the fact that not once was any member of Karate’s family questioned about Karate whereabouts during the time of the crime.

Maharaj Krishan Tickoo, brother of Satish Tickoo had sought monitoring of the investigation by the court by seeking status report on a regular basis from the investigating agency.

Tickoo’s lawyer, Utsav Bains has moved the session court for redemption of the trial. The session court has ordered that charges be framed against Bitta Karate.

The case is coming up for hearing in the middle of this month. Tickoo’s brother has pleaded for justice for the family that has lived in agony for 31 years with the killer of their bread winner wearing murders of the Pandit community on his collar as if he had been on a trophy hunting expedition.

–IANS