Delhi cops quiz Shahbad residents seen on CCTV, to join probe

17 people were identified through CCTV footage, and have been asked to join the investigation.

The Delhi Police has questioned 17 residents of northwest Delhi’s Shahbad Dairy area in connection with the May 28 murder of a 16-year-old girl in the locality, officers aware of the matter said on Tuesday.

People near the spot of crime, at Shahbad Dairy on Tuesday. (Sanchit Khanna/HT Photo)

Ravi Kumar Singh, deputy commissioner of police (outer north), said the 17 people were identified through CCTV footage, and have been asked to join the investigation.

“They are mostly local residents, including the family and friends of the deceased, who reside near the place of incident. We are asking them about the murder and relationship between the deceased and assailant. We are also asking them why they didn’t intervene when the incident was taking place. If their statements appear important from the viewpoint of investigation, we’ll make them witnesses in the case,” he said.

On Sunday, Sahil, 20, stabbed the girl — his former girlfriend — at least 16 times, kicked her limp body, and battered her relentlessly with a stone slab in a brutal attack in a narrow lane in Shahbad Dairy on Sunday, even as several passersby did little to intervene, the police said. The murder was caught on a surveillance camera and led to widespread outrage across the Capital.

The 20-year-old fled to his aunt’s house in Uttar Pradesh’s Bulandshahr, and was arrested from that city on Monday after police traced a call he made to his mother. After his medical examination there, Sahil was brought to the national Capital late in the evening.

Delhi is one of the most surveilled city in the world, thanks to the Delhi City Surveillance CCTV project, executed by the Public Works Department. Under the first phase of the project implemented from June 2019 to November 2021, 275,000 cameras were installed across the city, and in the second phase, 140,000 more cameras will be set up in Delhi.

Singh said the CCTV footage will be the most vital evidence for the prosecution in this case.

“The CCTV cameras installed in this area have been installed by the Delhi government. The footage is the most scientific and technical evidence, which is admissible in court of law. We will seize the footage properly and then produce it before the court. Eyewitnesses can turn hostile at any moment during the trial of the case, but the scientific evidence can’t be tampered with,” he said.

DCP Singh said that apart from the bystanders, investigators are also examining Sahil’s interaction with the deceased’s friends. “We have also asked the deceased’s former boyfriend to join the investigation. He is currently in Jaunpur. These people can give us leads to find out the immediate cause of the estranged relation between the deceased and Sahil. We’ll also ask them whether any quarrel took place between them… We are also trying to find out why, despite being informed of the murder, the deceased’s parents did not go to the place of the incident, and why they didn’t raise an alarm to help people to take her to hospital,” he said.