A city court on Saturday granted bail to Gaganpreet Kaur, the key accused in the BMW incident that rammed into a two wheeler being ridden by Navjot Singh, a senior finance ministry official and his wife, saying the accident’s CCTV footage showed the allegation of culpable homicide was on a “fragile foundation.” Rapping an ambulance driver and a paramedic who arrived at the spot within seconds for not showing “humanity” and failing in their professional duty, the court said the primary golden-hour lapse on the footage was because of them, who, despite being first on scene, rendered no aid.
The court also expressed astonishment that a DTC bus, which came in contact with the motorcycle, continued to drive without caring for the impact caused by the accident. Kaur, 38, is accused of being behind the wheel of the BMW car that rammed into a two-wheeler being ridden by Navjot Singh, a senior finance ministry official, and his wife. The 52-year-old government employee died, while his wife was grievously injured in the incident.
Judicial Magistrate Ankit Garg said, “Considering the CCTV-established sequence of loss of control, divider impact, flip, and contact; the ambulance’s immediate arrival and abrupt departure without assistance, undermining the attribution of golden-hour loss to the accused; the documentary nature of the remaining investigation; and the absence of antecedents and availability of enforceable conditions to obviate tampering, I find that the applicant has made out a case for bail at this stage.”
The court underlined the judicial precedents: presumption of innocence, and bail being the norm, and jail the exception. “Tested on these touchstones, the present case, particularly in light of the CCTV record, tilts in favour of bail with safeguards,” it said.
The court said, according to the footage, the car lost control, struck the divider, flipped, and, while flipping, came into contact with the motorcyclist. The people on the motorcycle then hit a bus, and the pillion rider fell in front of the BMW car while the driver of the motorcycle was crushed beneath it. “Very astonishingly, the DTC bus, in whose contact the motorcycle comes, does not even stop. It slows down for a while and then carries on, without caring for the impact caused by the accident,” it said.
The court said the footage did not support a straightforward, deliberate high-speed ramming of the motorcycle from behind version, but a loss of control culminating in a flip that led to the tragic contact with the car and the bus. Underlining that the Delhi Police invoked various Section 105 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) in the case, the court said that the footage brought the occurrence closer to rash or negligent driving than to culpable homicide premised on the mode of collision. It said that the FIR stated the BMW car struck the motorcycle from behind in a direct collision, but the footage did not corroborate it.
“Whether a higher mental element can ultimately be proved is a matter for trial; at the bail stage, the reduced strength of that allegation must be duly weighed,” it said. “An official ambulance, empty and immediately behind the vehicles involved, is seen (in the footage) arriving within two seconds. The ambulance, after watching the incident, stops at some distance, and the driver and paramedic rush towards the scene, but without offering any help or assistance, come back in a relaxed manner within 40 seconds,” it said.
The court said the footage revealed that when the paramedic and driver approached, the motorcyclist was unconscious beneath the car, but they did not check the pulse or administer first aid, and departed within roughly 40 seconds, manoeuvring their vehicle out. They were the first to leave the scene, it said.
The court thus denounced the driver’s and paramedics’ “highly unprofessional and unethical” conduct. Expressing exasperation, the court said that the ambulance, which “miraculously” appeared within two seconds of the accident, was empty, did not have any other assignment and was going towards Base Hospital, yet it failed to intervene and fled from the spot quickly. “The victim, due to ignorance of duty by the paramedics (ambulance driver and the paramedic), was taken almost seven minutes after the accident towards the hospital.
“Lives could have been saved, aid could have been provided swiftly, only if they had shown some humanity and just done their duty. Therefore, their failure to provide aid/assistance shall also be looked at through the lens of professional misconduct,” the court added. It also rejected the prosecution’s argument that the victim could have survived if timely medical aid had been provided by the accused.
On the allegation that the injured was taken to a faraway hospital, the court said whether Kaur was trying to help the victim or create evidence in her favour was a question for investigation and trial. “But, the CCTV footage, the conduct of the DTC bus driver and crucially, the conduct of paramedics, erodes the principal factual plank for BNS Section 105 (death due to delayed proper care), especially when the post-mortem report is awaited,” the court said. It said the prosecution had no requirement for the accused’s police custody, as no such application had been made till now.
