New Delhi: Police move court seeking more time to conclude probe

New Delhi : The Delhi Police moved a court here on Thursday seeking more time to complete their investigation in the Parliament security breach case, saying certain reports are awaited and voluminous digital data collected by them needed to be scrutinised.

The city police requested Additional Sessions Judge Hardeep Kaur to grant three more months to them for concluding the investigation. The judge issued notice to the jailed accused Neelam Azad, Manoranjan D, Sagar Sharma, Lalit Jha, Amol Shinde and Mahesh Kumawat on the application and sought their replies by March 11. In a major security breach on the anniversary of the 2001 Parliament terror attack, two persons -- Sharma and Manoranjan D -- jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the public gallery during Zero Hour on Dec 13 last year, released a yellow gas canister and shouted slogans, before being overpowered by MPs. Around the same time, two other accused -- Shinde and Azad -- also sprayed coloured gas from canisters while shouting “tanashahi nahi chalegi” (dictatorship will not work) outside Parliament premises.

Without the court’s permission, the probe agency would have had three months from the day of the arrest to complete the probe.

As per law, if a probe agency fails to complete the investigation within the stipulated time, the accused in custody have a statutory right to bail.