Wrestler murder case: court denies anticipatory bail to Olympic medallist Sushil

A Delhi court on Tuesday declined to grant anticipatory bail to Sushil Kumar, India's double Olympic medallist in wrestling, in connection with a brawl at Chhatrasal Stadium, which led to the death of a wrestler.

Additional sessions judge Jagdish Kumar declined to grant the relief to Kumar who has been booked for murder, abduction and criminal conspiracy. Kumar in his plea seeking anticipatory bail filed by advocate Kumar Vaibhaw has said:  "unfounded, baseless, scurrilous and preposterous allegations have been made against the applicant maliciously with the only motive to humiliate and injure the reputation of the applicant." The police said Kumar is the main accused who has played a key role  in the commission of offence.

The police have also announced a cash award of Rs.50,000 for anyone who provides information on Sushil's associate Ajay Kumar, who is a co-accused in the murder of Sagar Dhankar, a former international wrestler. On May 4, two groups  of wrestlers clashed at Chhatrasal Stadium, resulting in the death of 23-year-old Dhankar.

Kumar, in the plea, argued that statement of the victims has been recorded and alleged recoveries have also been made, therefore no custodial interrogation was required. Kumar also claimed that he has no connection with the alleged  firing, which took place during the brawl.

Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, representing Kumar, questioned before the court the act of prosecution seizing Kumar's passport. 

Additional public prosecutor Atul Shrivastava replied, "We have an apprehension that he may flee  from the country." Shrivastava added that there is electronic evidence against Kumar.

Police insisted on Kumar's custodial interrogation to reveal the conspiracy and also to recover the weapon of offence from him.

Citing the falsity in allegations, Kumar's plea said that as per the PCR call the incident took place at around 1.19 hours on May 5, 2021 and the distance from the place of incident, Chhatrasal Stadium, and the police station  PS Model Town is just one kilometre. However, the FIR has been registered after an unexplained delay of around 5-6 hours. "It further appears that that the entire delay in registration of the FIR is to falsely implicate the Applicant in the present matter",  the plea added.

In the anticipatory bail plea, Kumar said: "The victims are falsely implicating the applicant because he had asked Sagar to leave his property as the same was being misused by him. It is also known to every associated with the  Chhatrasal stadium that the purported victims were trying to defame and fix the Applicant for a long time and are trying to falsely implicate the applicant in the present matter."

Kumar claimed he is innocent of all wrongdoing and has been falsely implicated in the present case. 

The Delhi Police have filed an FIR under various sections: 302 (murder), 308  (culpable homicide), 365 (kidnapping), 325 (causing grievous hurt), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (wrongful restraint) and 506 (criminal intimidation). The police have also included sections 269 (negligent act likely to spread infection of disease),  120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 34 (common intention) of IPC and various sections under the Arms Act.