By IANS
New Delhi : A city court Thursday ordered Sher Singh Rana, the alleged killer of parliament member and former ‘Bandit Queen’ Phoolan Devi, to be present before it March 28. Rana was absent when his plea to transfer his case to another court came up for hearing.
District judge Satnam Singh issued the warrant for Rana and two other accused in the case, Shekhar and Dheeraj, to be present before it March 28.
Last month, Rana and the other two accused had moved the court of Additional Sessions Judge V.K. Bansal, saying they did not have faith in the judge hearing the case.
“I do not have faith in you. Kindly transfer the case to any other court,” Rana had said.
The court forwarded Rana’s plea to Judge Mamta Sehgal, who is the judge in charge of the Patiala House courts.
Later, Judge Sehgal asked Rana to formally file his application for case transfer before the district judge.
Rana’s petition came up when district judge Satnam Singh was about to record a statement of prosecution witness Bahadur Shah.
The prosecution had presented Shah as a key witness, as Rana had allegedly fled in Shah’s auto-rickshaw after shooting Phoolan Devi down outside her official residence at 44, Ashoka Road residence in New Delhi July 25, 2001.
According to the prosecution, Rana and 11 others had conspired to kill Phoolan Devi, a Samajwadi Party parliament member, to avenge the 1981 massacre in Behmai of 20 upper caste people for which she had been blamed.