The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the CBI to place its probe report into the 2007 Nandigram police firing to take a final decision on initiating criminal proceedings against several accused police officers. The decision has been held back since December 13,2007 when a Constitution Bench was set up to decide to whether a court can direct the CBI to inquire into a matter without asking the state concerned. This was especially the case in the Nandigram probe,which was referred to the CBI by the Calcutta High Court. Following the firing in nandigram on March 14,2007,the High Court had asked the CBI to investigate what prompted the police to open fire when thousands of villagers had gathered to protest against the attempts by the police to enter Nandigram. Thursday's SC decision to check the CBI's investigation report of February 15,2008 comes in the backdrop of the Constitution Bench's judgment that courts can indeed order a CBI probe without involving the state government. The report is already on record with the state High Court. A Bench of Justices RV Raveendran and AK Patnaik asked the CBI to file the report in a sealed cover within a fortnight. The Bench,however,did not take up an NHRC application for a judicial order to the Bengal government to pay compensation to the victims of the aftermath of the firing incident between March 15,2007 and November 5,2007. It is submitted by learned counsel for the NHRC that the matter is now seized by the Calcutta High Court. It is,therefore,appropriate for the NHRC to make the said application before the High Court as at present the matter before this court is restricted to the incident of 14.3.2007, the Bench wrote in its order. The High Court had directed the Bengal government to pay a uniform compensation of Rs 5 lakh to families of each of the 14 persons killed and Rs 2 lakh and Rs 1 lakh to those raped and injured. The state government had challenged the High Court order,saying it was erroneous to indict policemen for the so-called unjustified firing at Nandigram.
