Nagaland moves SC to prosecute 30 Armymen

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court on Monday admitted a writ petition by Nagaland govt challenging the Centre’s one-and-a-half-year-old order denying sanction for prosecution of 30 Armymen who were named in the FIR lodged by state police for killing 13 civilians in a botched-up operation to ambush militants in Mon district on Dec 4, 2021.
Moving the petition, filed under Article 32 of the Constitution invoking violation of the fundamental rights of citizens, before a bench of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, state advocate general K N Balgopal said though state police has clinching evidence against the Armymen, including a Major, the Centre has arbitrarily refused to accord sanction for their prosecution.
“The competent authority in the Union government has, without application of mind and going through the entire material collected by the special investigation team (of state police) during the course of investigation, arbitrarily and against public interest refused sanction to prosecute the accused Armymen,” Nagaland govt said.
The bench issued notices to the Centre and the ministry of defence and sought their responses within four weeks.
In July 2022, the SC had stayed prosecution of the armed force personnel belonging to Alpha team of 21 Para (Special Forces) on petitions from the wives of the accused as they claimed that their husbands were being prosecuted without the state obtaining mandatory sanction for prosecution from the Centre. They had also sought quashing of the FIRs. The Centre on Feb 28 last year refused to sanction prosecution of these personnel.
The state said the Army ambush team had opened fire on a Bolero pickup vehicle carrying coal miners without challenging or asking them to identify themselves. It cited the claim of the ambush team that they had positively identified those killed as they were carrying a gun and weapons, wearing dark clothes and had quickly jumped into the vehicle.
“The above factors are common among villagers in Nagaland. The Army surveillance team had no basic knowledge about ground realities in Nagaland, where it is common to carry hunting guns,” the state said.
After the initial ambush killed six civilians, angry villagers clashed with the Army, leading to the death of another seven villagers and a soldier. The entire evidence collected by the SIT was sent to the department of military affairs in New Delhi on March 24, 2022, seeking sanction for prosecution.