A court in Punjab has refused to accept a cancellation report filed by the Punjab Police for closing a case in which judge Bikramdeep Singh stands accused of committing theft at the residence of another judge last year..In order dated April 29, Judicial Magistrate Ist Class Prabha Prashar said that there exists sufficient material to proceed further in the case against Bikramdeep Singh. "Accordingly, the cancellation report filed by the police is hereby rejected and is returned back to the concerned SHO with a direction to conduct further investigation as per law and to submit a fresh report after further investigation," the Court ordered.In the case registered at Lahori Gate Police Station in Patiala on March 21, civil judge Bikramdeep Singh and others were accused of allegedly stealing gold and jewellery last year from the residence of Additional District & Sessions Judge Kanwaljit Singh on the night he died at a hospital.A court in Patiala last month denied anticipatory bail to judge Bikramdeep Singh. Soon thereafter, the Punjab and Haryana High Court transferred Bikramdeep Singh from Patiala district court to Tarn Taran.However, the police later decided to close the matter by filing a cancellation report, after the complainant said no theft had taken place. .Judge Prashar declined to accept the report, observing that there were significant deficiencies in the investigation.The Court noted that the investigation failed to reveal anything about the contents of the bags allegedly carried by the accused persons on the date of incident and which was caught on the CCTV footage."There is no material on record to identify or establish the nature of the articles allegedly taken. The investigation is further silent with regard to the contents of the bags as reflected in the CCTV footage and no effort appears to have been made to correlate the same with any alleged stolen property," the Magistrate said. The Court also said that police had failed to conduct a proper investigation into the discovery of the alleged stolen items."There is no clear material showing the place of recovery, the manner of recovery, or any inventory matching the alleged stolen articles with the articles allegedly found," the judge said..The police had registered the criminal case on the complaint of Dr. Bhupinder Singh Virk, who was given power of attorney by the deceased judge's son. Virk is a a professor in the Department of Law at Punjabi University Patiala.In the complaint, Virk had said that after his friend Kanwaljit Singh passed away at Amar Hospital on August 1, 2025, his house help Amarjit Kaur alias Pinky, one Gaurav Goel, a government officer and " an unknown person" came in three cars to the deceased judge's residence. "Out of these four people, Gaurav stayed outside, and the remaining three went inside the house and started rummaging through the house of my friend Late Kanwaljit Singh, Additional District Judge, Sangrur. At that time, these three people, after searching my friend's house, took away ancestral gold, jewellery, and cash from the house," the complaint alleged..Bikramdeep Singh had denied the allegations, stating that he had been asked by Kanwaljit Singh's son Angadpal Singh, who was then in Canada, to secure the valuables immediately. Bikramdeep also claimed that he later returned the valuables when Angadpal Singh stayed at his residence.In a twist, the complainant in a supplementary statement on April 16 told the police that the missing articles and cash were found in the house itself. The complainant also said the FIR was a result of a misunderstanding.Considering the complainant's statement, the police then filed the present cancellation report, stating that prosecution in the case would be a sheer wastage of court's time..The Court refused to accept the report, stating that the complainant was only representing the deceased judge's sons under a power of attorney. No independent statement of the sons was recorded by the agency, the Court said.The absence of their statements and their non-appearance before the Court creates a doubt regarding the veracity of the conclusion drawn in the cancellation report, the judge opined.She added that subsequent statement of the complainant, who is merely an attorney holder, cannot be made the sole basis for accepting the cancellation report, particularly when the material collected during investigation, including CCTV footage, discloses circumstances warranting deeper scrutiny..The Court also said that the offences of house-trespass and theft are non-compoundable in nature and cannot be settled or closed merely on the basis of alleged compromise between the parties..Additional Public Prosecutor Harpreet Singh represented the State.Advocate Navdeep Sharma represented the complainant.[Read Order]
