Murder convicts stole files to evade High Court verdict: CBI

The CBI has registered a case into alleged theft and destruction of court records by two court officials to help murder convicts trying to escape possible life term sentence from the Allahabad High Court.
The CBI had taken over investigation into the case on the instructions of the Allahabad High Court which had found that records of appeal challenging the life term given by Aligarh session court to two accused - Basudev and Rajveer - over three decades back, were missing during hearing last year.
The High Court had last year ordered the agency to probe the matter after which it had registered a preliminary enquiry.

The preliminary enquiry is the first step to verify the allegations and whether further probe is required by registering a formal case also known as FIR.
During its preliminary enquiry, CBI unravelled the alleged conspiracy hatched by some court officials and sons of both the convicts to steal and destroy the court files.
The theft was allegedly executed by two peons of the High Court with one of them, Dilip Kumar Chandel, being a distant relative of the convicts.

The enquiry found that when the appeal against the life term awarded by Aligarh sessions court came for final hearing at the Division Bench of the High Court last year, it was apprehended by the sons of Basudev and Rajveer during discussion with Chandel that conviction might be upheld.

It said that Chandel took Rs 30,000 to steal the files which were being taken by pleaders for destruction.
The findings of the enquiry has been mentioned in the order of the Allahabad High Court on the basis of which CBI has now registered an FIR.
The agency has registered the FIR against Basudev and Rajveer, both convicts, their sons Subhash Chandra and Chandra Veer Singh respectively and peons Dilip Kumar Chandel and Narendra Kumar who aided in stealing the files.