Darbara Singh

Case record: Darbara Singh

Status and legal outcome

Darbara Singh was sentenced to death on January 7, 2008. His death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Darbara Singh was acquitted in one more rape and murder case.

In December 2010, a local court acquitted serial baby killer Darbara Singh in a rape and murder case in which he had abducted a six-year-old girl Tajvin from the area under the jurisdiction of Model Town police station in 2004 and, after killing her, threw her body in the bushes near Cheheru village situated on the Jalandhar-Phagwara road. The court acquitted the accused on the grounds that the prosecution had failed to prove the charges. The police recovered the body of the girl on the instance of Darbara Singh from the bushes after he was arrested by the police in other cases of killing girl children after raping them. Seventeen cases of rape and killing girl children were registered against Darbara Singh in 2004. In the Tajvin case registered against Darbara Singh on Sept. 2, 2004, the court of additional sessions Judge BS Sidhu acquitted the accused.

Background

Darbara Singh was described as a “serial baby killer” and an ex-serviceman.

In 1975, he allegedly lobbed a hand-grenade at Major V.K. Sharma’s house in Pathankot after an altercation. The Major’s son and wife were injured in the explosion. Singh was arrested in the case and sent to judicial custody, but after a trial he was acquitted and reinstated in the Army. Singh had also been arrested in three cases of attempt to murder by the Kapurthala police and was subsequently sentenced to undergo imprisonment for 30 years.

After his Kapurthala posting, Singh was said to have started selling his quota of CSD liquor to migrant labourers and took to molesting girls in these colonies. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison after some migrant labourers lodged a complaint, and his sentence was later revised, with his release in December 2003.

Darbara Singh was shunted out of his house by his wife for his “bad habits,” and he had three children.

Darbara Singh lived in rented accommodation at Model House near his in-laws home and worked in a factory in the Leather Complex area. He used to target children of migrant labourers in localities dominated by migrant labourers.

He was said to have kept a grudge against migrant labourers, asserting that it was because of a migrant labourer family of Kapurthala that he had to waste 10 years of his life in jail. He asserted in front of Jalandhar SSP Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar that he could have killed more children of migrant labourers had he not been arrested “so soon.”

The offence

Darbara Singh abducted minor children, mostly migrants, and killed them after molestation/sexual assault. The record described killing methods including slitting throats and drowning. It also referred to attempts to rape or sodomise dead bodies in some cases.

He was alleged to have abducted at least 21 children and to have committed the crimes to avenge the 10 years he spent in prison. It was also stated that during the past seven months a total of 23 children, mostly below the age of 10, had gone missing from the city, with six recovered by police. His confession included that he had dumped the bodies of most of his victims near a bridge on the Rayya-Khadoor Sahib road after subjecting them to rape or sodomy.

Darbara Singh’s modus operandi was described as luring victims using toffees, samosas, sugarcane juice and sweets, taking them to secluded places, and in most cases slitting the throat of the victim and attempting to rape. A statement attributed to him described slitting throats so that there would be no shrieks of victims, and it described killing babies to eliminate any possibility of leaving behind a proof. He also stated that he had consumed rum before committing a crime described in connection with the recovery of bodies.

He was connected to a case alleging the murders of two children, Khursheed (5) and his cousin Ropu (6), in 2004, with a fast-track court ordering a death sentence in that case.

Investigation

A special team was formed by SP (traffic) Rakesh Kaushal to pursue cases after his acquittal in three cases. The police prepared a computer-generated image of “the killer,” set a trap, and arrested him based on information and a sketch.

The record described that investigators suspected Singh when he was carrying a bag of toffees and because of his resemblance to a sketch prepared by Jalandhar police. It also described that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed by SSP Mr Bhullar studied the modus operandi in detail and a sketch was made based on information gathered from different sources.

Police statements attributed to SSP Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar included an account that the sustained study of the modus operandi adopted by the suspect brought success and that the accused had confessed to everything.

Arrest and custody

Darbara Singh was intercepted on the morning of October 29, when he was going from Leather Complex to Kapurthala on his bicycle. He carried a bag containing a handful of toffees, which made policemen suspicious. The interception was described as being led by Sadar SHO Pritam Singh and the CIA In Charge Sub Inspector Nirmal Singh.

He was arrested in a trap at Basti Bawa Khel.

After arrest, he was taken by the police team led by SSP G.S. Bhullar to identify crime sites.

He was remanded in police custody for 10 days by the court of Ilaqa Magistrate K.K. Kareer.

Timeline

• October 29, 2004 — Darbara Singh was intercepted by a police party led by Sadar SHO Pritam Singh and CIA In Charge Sub Inspector Nirmal Singh while going from Leather Complex to Kapurthala on his bicycle carrying a bag of toffees; he was arrested.
• October 30, 2004 — Police recovered bodies of Khursheed and Roku from a pit on the roadside near Kadianwali village, and Darbara Singh was remanded in 10 days’ police custody.
• October 30, 2004 — Police exhumed bodies of two recent victims from a sugarcane field; the bodies of five-year-old Khurshid and six-year-old Ruku were recovered from a sugarcane field.
• January 7, 2008 — Darbara Singh was sentenced to death.
• December 10, 2010 — A local court acquitted Darbara Singh in a rape and murder case for failure of prosecution to prove charges.

Trial and sentencing

A fast-track court ordered to hang Darbara Singh till death in a case relating to the murders of two children, Khursheed (5) and his cousin Ropu (6) in 2004, and an additional sessions judge I.S. Bajwa ordered the death sentence.

It was also stated that he was acquitted in three cases, while over 20 cases of murder, rape and sodomy of girls and boys were pending against him.

A local court acquitted Darbara Singh in the Tajvin case on the grounds that the prosecution had failed to prove the charges.

In a separate case described in 2006, a fast-track court had sentenced him to life imprisonment for kidnapping and murder of the minor daughter of a migrant labourer in Jalandhar in October 2004.

In February 2006, it was stated that a Punjab court sentenced him to life imprisonment for the second time for kidnapping and murder of the minor daughter of a migrant labourer in the city in October 2004. The record also said he had earlier been sentenced to life imprisonment for the rape of a migrant girl in Kapurthala in the mid-1990s and had been released from prison in December 2003 for “good conduct” before the end of the first life term.

Appeals

The record stated that the sentence in one case was converted to life imprisonment by the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Outcome

Darbara Singh’s death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment, and he was acquitted in an additional rape and murder case in December 2010 for want of evidence/failure of prosecution to prove the charges.

Other details

1) Victims and missing persons described

The record included the following victims and statuses:

• Lacchmi, 5, daughter of Ripudaman, resident of Basti Shiekh — gone missing on August 15, 2004; status - dead.
• Satish, 6, son of Gopal, H.No. 598, Model Town Jalandhar — gone missing on April 18, 2004; status - dead.
• Gudia, 10, sister of Satish — status - dead.
• Tazbin, 10, daughter of Maqsood, resident of Avtaar Nagar Jalandhar — abducted on August 22, 2004; status - dead.
• Sanju Kumar, 5, son of Umesh Shastri, resident of Basti Shiekh — abducted on August 24, 2004; status - dead.
• Poonam, 7, resident of Basti Peerdaad, daughter of Puna Ram — abducted on August 6, 2004; status - dead.
• Rajesh Kumar, 7 and his sister Geeta, 5, children of Narbahadur of Leather Complex — abducted on August 28, 2004; status - dead.
• Laloo Parsaad, 4, resident of Leather Complex — status - dead.
• Diksha, 10 and her sister Asha, daughters of Gobind of Rasta Mohalla — abducted on April 18, 2004; Diksha killed; Asha escaped and saved Rani, 9, resident of Jallowal Colony, killed in Nakodar.
• Nishu, 9, resident of Urban Estate Phase II — abducted on October 22; saved and admitted to the PGI, Chandigarh.
• Mumtaaz, sister of Tazbin, of Avtaar Nagar — escaped.
• Shankar, 8, son of Akhilesh, resident of GTB Nagar — abducted along Gudia and Satish but escaped.
• Amrit, 5 and his sister Karu of Leather Complex — status - abducted and killed.
• Ravina, 4, daughter of Mohd. Aziz, resident of Shastri Nagar — abducted on June 29, saved.
• Patal Kumari, daughter of Bharat Bhushan, resident of Basti Bawa Khel — abducted on June 29, saved.
• Nitika, 3, daughter of Bir Bahadur, resident of Basti Danishmandan — abducted on August 16, 2004, saved.
• Rajesh Kumar, 5, son of Mast Lal, Basti Bawa Khel — abducted on August 16, saved.
• Jatinder, 9, son of Rudra Ram, resident of Leather Complex — abducted on June 17, status - killed.
• Puja, 8, daughter of Ram Udhar — status - killed.
• Deepak, 4 — her brother killed.

The record also described additional victims and cases:

• Sanju and Lakshmi were mentioned as having gone missing on August 28, 2004 and August 15, 2004 respectively; both were in a murder case where Darbara got acquitted.
• It stated that Darbara had confessed that he had killed Sanju and Lakshmi and thrown their bodies in Raiya canal, but since the bodies of the girls were not recovered, he got acquitted.
• It stated that Darbara Singh was also acquitted in the murder cases of Satish (6) and his sister Sona (7), with both children going missing in 2004 from their house in Model Town and their bodies later recovered from a canal in Raiya in Amritsar district.

2) Specific bodies and recoveries described

• A day after nabbing Darbara Singh, police exhumed bodies of five-year-old Khurshid and six-year-old Ruku from a sugarcane field on the Jalandhar-Kalasanghia road; the report described them as cousins and members of Darbhanga in Bihar.
• The record described that Darbara Singh said he had killed Khurshid and Ruku by slitting their throats after sexually abusing them on October 25.
• The record described that Khurshid’s body was found on its back with its head turned slightly towards the left, while Ruku’s body was recovered in a highly decomposed state as she had virtually been beheaded.
• Police recovered a bottle of rum and a glass from the field; Darbara Singh said he consumed the rum before committing the crime, and the police took the items into custody for matching fingerprints.
• Police teams were despatched to Tarn Taran and Rayyia, where Darbara Singh said that he had killed most of his victims by drowning them.
• The record stated that Nishu, an 11-year-old girl injured by Darbara Singh near Adampur, was undergoing treatment at PGI, Chandigarh, and had immediately identified the accused on seeing his picture in newspapers.
• The record stated that Darbara Singh identified the spot in Shah Changi village where he had dumped the body of Laloo Parsad (6) after murdering him on August 16.
• The record stated that police recovered the bodies of Khursheed (4) and his cousin Roku (6) from a pit near Kadianwali village; Khursheed was described as the son of Mohammed Vaqil, and the record stated they were abducted from near their house in Basti Mithu on October 25.
• In the pit recovery description, the record stated that Roku’s body was naked and the throat had been slit, and it stated the bodies were recovered in the presence of an Executive Magistrate.

3) Defence and confinement details described

The record stated that Darbara Singh admitted he had dumped bodies near a bridge and that he had no remorse in quoted statements.

It also described that he denied using liquor at the time of committing crimes, while the record included separate mention that he had consumed rum before committing a crime described in the recovery reports.

4) Quotes

Darbara Singh was quoted:

• “I have no remorse for having killed the children of migrant labourers, as they were instrumental in sending me to jail,” he said.
• “I abducted children of migrants, and if any of these girls or boys resisted my attempts, I would slit their throats and simply dump or drown them. I also killed one Punjabi girl by mistake and I am a bit shaken by this. But I had no alternative, as she could have created problems for me. Similarly, I killed all babies to eliminate any possibility of leaving behind a proof,” he added.

Darbara Singh was also quoted again:

• “I don't dread anything. I think they (migrants) did wrong to me. I celebrated almost each of the killings with liquor and good food,” he added.
• “It (crimes) never shook me from inside. I still think whatever I did was right and it was the demand of the time. I also think that in future I won't do anything like this,” he said.
• “Still, I have no remorse. But at the same time, I think what was done by me was wrong and I promise that I would never do it again,” Darbara Singh told The Tribune.

In addition, SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar was quoted:

• “Our suspicion is based on similar abductions in Kapurthala district and recovery of two more mutilated bodies of babies in jungles of Jallupur Khera village of Amritsar district,” an official was quoted as saying.
• “What had made our task difficult was that the baby killer was not running a gang and he had no permanent address. This led to some delay in cracking the crime,” Bhullar said.
• “Our officers suspected the accused the very first moment they saw him carrying a bag of toffees. Thereafter, an informer recognised him After this, he was put to sustained questioning, which yielded its results. He confessed to everything, despite his appearance of being a hard nut to crack,” Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar said.
• “At the very first moment when he was stopped, he told the police party that they had reached the right place. Then he requested police officials not to beat him up, as he was ready to come out with minute details of the crimes committed by him. In fact, what brought success to us was the sustained study of the modus operandi adopted by this psychopath. What alarmed us was the almost similar kind of method used by him against all his victims. However, what baffled us a bit was the recovery of some bodies from different spots,” Bhullar said.
• “We will also take him to the Khadoor Sahib-Rayyia area, where Darbara Singh has confessed to have dumped a large number of bodies,” Bhullar was quoted as adding.
• “We will also take him to the Khadoor Sahib-Rayyia area, where Darbara Singh has confessed to have dumped a large number of bodies,” Bhullar said.

5) FIR and charges mentioned

An FIR under Sections 364 and 302 of the IPC was registered in connection with the disappearance and killing of Khursheed and Ropu described in October 2004.

6) Named officers and investigators mentioned

The record named: SP (traffic) Rakesh Kaushal, SSP G.P.S. Bhullar, SSP G.S. Bhullar / Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, SHO Pritam Singh, CIA In Charge Sub Inspector Nirmal Singh, SSP Mr Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, officers referenced as Mr Rajpal Sandhu and Mr Rakesh Kaushal, and DSPs referenced as Mr Rajjit Singh, Mr Rajinder Singh and Mr Charanjit Singh. It also named Court of additional sessions Judge BS Sidhu and additional sessions judge I.S. Bajwa and Ilaqa Magistrate K.K. Kareer.