- Citation: Criminal Appeal No(S). 2227 Of 2010
- Bench: Hon'ble Mr Justice MarkandeyKatju, Hon'ble Mrs Justice Gyan Sudha Misra
- Appellant: Surendra Koli & Maninder Singh Pandher
- Respondent: State of Uttar Pradesh
Facts of the case:
Two Nithari residents claimed in December 2006 that they knew where the remains of children who had gone missing in the previous two years were located: the municipal water tank behind the building. Both had missing daughters and they suspected SurinderKoli, the disappearances included domestic aid. The residents claimed to have been consistently ignored by local authorities; thus, they sought the assistance of former president S C Mishra of the Resident Welfare Association (RWA). Mishra and the two residents checked out the tank drain that morning. One of the residents reported a decomposed hand was found, after which they contacted police.Over the last two years worried parents of missing children rushed with photographs to Nithari. Koli later admitted to killing six children and a 20-year-old woman named "Payal" after sexually assaulting them, under the alias Satish.
The missing children's families have accused police of incompetence. Some police officers, including Noida SP city, initially denied any criminal angle and claimed that the families had received false details about the age of the missing; that they were not minors but adults who left home after fighting with their parents. The residents also claimed the police were corrupt and paid to cover up the evidence. Demands for an impartial enquiry were made. One of the residents said that when it was the residents who dug them up, police took credit for finding the corpses. The police denied discovering fifteen bodies, reiterating that they had found pieces of the skulls, bones and other body parts and that they could not provide a figure for the number of victims. The names and number of the victims could be determined only with DNA tests. Police then sealed the house and refused to allow news media near to the site. The Central Government sought to determine the truth behind the discovery of the remains of the skeleton and whether it had "inter-state ramifications. " Law and order are state affairs, but the Home Ministry asked for clarification on the extent of the crime.
In connection with the disappearance of "Payal," police took Koli's boss, Moninder Singh Pandher and Koli into custody on 26 and 27 December respectively. The police started digging up the surrounding land area after Koli's confession, and found the bodies of the twins. On 31 December two policemen were suspended for failing to take action despite being told of a number of missing children, as angry residents accused towards the house of the angry mastermind. The situation at Nithari escalated as a angry mob of villagers clashed with police, both pelting stones at each other, just outside the accused's residence. Pandher's maid Maya was also detained by police on suspicion that she attracted women to the building. As more body parts were dug up near the premises, hundreds of local residents descended on the spot alleging an organ trafficking connection with the grisly killing of young children.[3] A doctor living near the Pandher home, NavinChoudhary, had been under police suspicion in connection with an alleged kidney racket at his hospital a few years earlier. Searches were carried out in his estate, and the investigators found no evidence to support the claim.
Judgment:
The bench verbatim pronounced that, ‘In the statement before the Magistrate appellant SurendraKolihas admitted in great detail how he used to kill the girls after luring them inside the House no. D-5, Sector 31, Noida by strangulating them and he would then chop up and eat up their body parts after cooking them. Some body parts, clothes and slippers were thrown in the enclosed gallery behind the house at D-5, Sector 31, Noida. He volunteered to lead the police team to the specific spot where he had kept the articles/body parts hidden. The police party reached that spot along with the appellant. On his pointing out, 15 skulls and bones were recovered, and also a knife was recovered from a water tank of a bath room in D-5, Sector 31. On 31.12.2006 during the scooping of the drain in front of D-5, bones and chappals were recovered. He has given graphic description about the several murders he has committed. SurendraKoli was the servant of co-accused Maninder Singh Pandher as has been admitted by him. The confession under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Codehas been corroborated in material particulars. The body parts of the killed girls have been found in the gallery behind the house and in the Nala beside the house.
Two girls namely Pratibha and Purnima have stated before the trial Court that they were also attempted to be lured inside the House D-5 by SurendraKoli but they refused to enter the house. This was their sheer good luck, for if they would have entered the house then they might have met the same fate. Their evidence indicates the modus operandi of the appellant.
The killings by the appellant Surendra Koli are horrifying and barbaric. He used a definite methodology in committing these murders. He would see small girls passing by the house, and taking advantage of their weakness lures them inside the house no. D-5, Sector 31, Nithari Village, Noida and there he would strangulate them and after killing them he tried to have sex with the body and would then cut off their body parts and eat them. Some parts of the body were disposed off by throwing them in the passage gallery and drain (nala) beside the house. House no. D-5, Sector 31 had become a virtual slaughter house, where innocent children were regularly butchered.
In the opinion of the jury thus, this case clearly fell within the category of rarest of rare case and the bench opined that no mercy could be shown to the appellant SurendraKoli.
