The High Court of Allahabad on May 19, upheld the acquittal of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra Teni in the 23-year-old Prabhat Gupta murder case
With this decision, the panel of Justices Attaur Rahman Masoodi and Om Prakash Shukla rejected the UP government's appeal against the trial court's 2004 decision to acquit him.
The incident began in 2000 when Gupta, a prominent student, was fatally shot close to his home in Tikonia, Lakhimpur Kheri. Four people, including Teni, were identified as defendants in this lawsuit. Rakesh Dalu, Shashi Bhushan Pinky, and Subhash Mama were the other participants.
Teni was exonerated by the trial court in 2004, but the state government of the time appealed to the high court.
Father of the dead Prabhat Gupta, Santosh Gupta, filed a revision petition with the high court pursuant to Section 397/401 of the Cr.P.C.
According to the accusations made against Teni, he and the other accused shot the deceased to death because they disagreed with him on the Panchayat elections.
On the other hand, Teni's attorneys argued that other witnesses had become hostile and the trial court had not considered the testimony of the putative eyewitness to be credible. Three times, the jury's decision in the case had been reserved.
On March 12, 2018, a bench of Justices Dinesh Kumar Singh and Devendra Kumar Upadhyay reserved the verdict for the first time. On November 10, 2022, the Supreme Court issued another order reserving the judgement, and Justices Ramesh Sinha and Renu Aggarwal carried it out.
On February 21, 2023, the Justices Masoodi and Shukla reserved the judgement for the third time. Reporters were informed by Prabhat Gupta's family that they will file an appeal with the Supreme Court in opposition to the high court's decision.
"The case been going on for 23 years and now we are told that there is no accused. My brother was killed but the court says no one killed him," his brother said.
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