Delhi / Delhi court sends wrestler Sushil Kumar to 9-day judicial custody

New Delhi: A Delhi court on Wednesday rejected a plea by the Delhi Police for the custodial interrogation of arrested wrestler Sushil Kumar in the alleged murder of a young wrestler at the Chhatrasal Stadium, news agency PTI reported. The court has also sent him to nine days of judicial custody, rejecting the police’s plea for three more days of custodial interrogation.

The two-time Olympic medalist was produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Rashmi Gupta at the end of his four-day police custody and was ordered to be sent to judicial custody for nine days. “As per the settled law, PC [police custody] remand should not be granted in a mechanical manner. It should be granted only when the situation warrants and it is justified,” PTI quoted magistrate Gupta as saying.

Ajay Kumar Sehrawat, the co-accused in the case, has also been sent to nine-day judicial custody by the court.

Meanwhile, additional public prosecutor Atul Shrivastava, representing the Delhi Police, told the court that Kumar was not cooperating in the investigation. He further said that the police custody was needed to recover his mobile phone and weapon of offence. The prosecutor also asked for the CCTV camera recordings at Kumar’s residence, his clothes during the incident need to be recovered and Kumar to be confronted with his associates, who were also arrested.

However, Sushil Kumar’s advocate Pradeep Rana said that he had already been taken to Bhatinda for the recovery of the mobile phone and to Haridwar for the recovery of the video and his clothes.

Kumar was arrested earlier on May 23 after which the court ordered six-day police custody and further extended it by four more days. He is currently facing charges of murder, culpable homicide and kidnapping, for the assault of Sagar Dhankar and his friends Sonu Mahal and Amit Kumar regarding a property dispute. Dhankar, 23, eventually succumbed to his injuries. The police have termed Kumar as the ‘mastermind’ of the alleged murder. Police have also said that electronic evidence is available of Kumar and his associates assaulting Dhankar with sticks.