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Forensic Investigation: Mystery Of Burning Of Holy Books
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BRZ is a Forensic Scientist, Crime Scene Investigator, Chemistry, Ballistics, Fire and Explosives Expert, Arson Investigator, Forensic Investigation and Analysis Expert with world-class expertise in forensic science, trace evidence analysis, chemistry, ballistics, explosives, crime scene analysis and expert witness testimony. Extensive experience in crime scene investigation, investigating, reconstructing, examining and reporting on hundreds of crime scenes for arson & fire, explosions, chemistry, drugs, murder, rape, homicide, and theft.
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The atrocities of crime by the terrorists are not only towards killing, looting, rape and other heinous crimes but also to exploit the religious feelings of the people of different sections of the society by commit-ting sacrilege with one action or the other at the places of worship either by burning the place itself or by damaging the holy books placed therein. In such case the scene of occurrence is sometimes misleading by intentional approach by the miscreants or accused persons.
The present paper cites a case of burning of holy books in a place of worship. The incident aroused unrest in the prevailing circumstances of communal feeling in the State of Punjab. The issue was fully exploited by the unsocial elements of the concerned community. To combat the possible deterioration of law and order situation due to exploitation of the sentiments of the particular community, the Forensic Scientists were confronted with the task of opining the cause of the incident. It was urgently required to ascertain whether it was an act by a group of people to use religious unrest or by any interested individual or personal gain.
The scene of occurrence was thoroughly searched by the Investigating Officer and the suspects were interrogated. The interrogation of the suspect and con-cerned persons revealed that some miscreants had tried to burn the holy books-by sprinkling petrol. But in spite of thorough search of the two rooms involved . in the incident no such inflammable substance like, petrol or kerosene oil container etc. could be recovered by the police. The findings of the Investigating Officer that attempt to burn the holy books by sprinkling kerosene/petrol needed positive confirmation of Forensic Expert's opinion. With this in view, all the physical evidence found at the crime scene associated with the burning were collected by the Investigating Officer.
The articles collected from the first room were as under :
(1) Ash of the burn clothes.
(2) Half partially burnt piece of plastic can.
(3) Half partially burnt piece of cotton.
(4) Partially burnt piece of cloth (purple colour
with golden flowers rumalla).
(5) One half burnt white sheet, burnt from
sides.
(6) One white sheet containing burnt spots
on it.
(7) One half burnt Terri-cot white Colour cloth.
(8) One table cloth of cotton thread burnt from
one side.
(9) One guika (nit name) burnt from one side.
(10) Two wooden side table having burnt impression.
The articles collected from the second room were as under:
(1) One white cotton sheet burnt from one
side.
(2) One synthetic rumalla with flowers having
only three singing holes at one corner.
(3) Two packets of dhoop.
(4) One rod of dhoop.
(5) Two match-boxes (one empty and one full of
match sticks).
(6) Fifty-six (56) burnt match sticks.
(7) One thin stick of wood burnt from one
side.
All the above-mentioned articles were sent to Forensic Laboratory for furnishing the opinion whether any chemical or inflammable material were used for burning the holy books.
Ashes of (the burnt clothes, partially burnt clothes, burnt match sticks, partially burnt chattai and other .articles were examined for characteristic smell of petroleum products or any other inflammable sub-stance. No smell was detected. The other exhibits were also examined for characteristic smell but it did not reveal characteristic smell of petroleum products or any chemical. Thereafter the exhibits were subjected for chemical examination for presence of petrol/ kerosene oil and other petroleum products. They were washed and distilled. By adopting macoun's method it was found that kerosene oil and other petroleum pro-ducts were absent in all the burnt portions of the exhibits including papers of the holy book. The experimental results and observations confirmed that the holy books could not have been burnt by pouring petrol, any other petroleum product or inflammable chemical substance.
Thus, the forensic findings did not substantiate the alleged apprehensions of the police. Though the opinion furnished on the queries raised by the police were complete, it was necessary to provide necessary assistance to the investigating agency about the manner in which the holy books were burnt, so as to lay hands on the suspect or accused. From the avail-able articles collected from the scene of crime, attempt was made to reconstruct the occurrence of burning.
The most significant evidentiary clue was fifty-six burnt match sticks recovered from the crime scene. This suggested that repeated attempts to burn the holy books were made by the accused because the necessity of using match slicks on number of occasions was highly improbable in attempt to burn by inflammable substances such as kerosene oil. petrol etc. The other evidentiary clues, the burnt holy books, clothes and wrapped while sheets were examined thoroughly.
(i) The cloth wrapped over the holy book on physical examination, was found intact at the four corners. The four corners of the cloth in the stretched condition were not burnt. This led to infer that attempt to burn the holy book was made when all the four corners of the wrapped cloth were almost near the centre in the normal customary way as is usually kept from the central place.
(ii) On physical examination of other portions of] the wrapped cloth it was found that the clothes were burnt partially on all the folds. This sug-gested that several attempts were made to burn the cloth by making use of repeated fire source such as by burning of match sticks. The pre-sence of huge quantity of match sticks near the burnt holy book/clothes confirmed repeat-ed fire source and the manner in which the holy book wrapped in the cloth was put to fire by repeated match stick fire.
(iii)On physical examination of the white knitted cloth on the adjoining small peg table the cloth was found partially burnt on one side having characteristic shape of burning almost like a cone. The wood corresponding to burnt portion of the white cloth was also partially charred. The characteristic shape and size of the burnt portion suggested that sufficient flame/heat must have resulted from the burn-ing of the white cloth and the wooden table. and the same could be due to the chawer in burning condition kept on the side peg table. The examination of the front portion of the chawer having woollen/synthetic fibers con-firmed the suggestion that the chawer would have caught fire quickly and would have caused more flame or heat to the cloth. It could be safely concluded that fibrous part of the chawer could have been burnt by match stick and after it started burning, the same must have been kept in burning condition on the white cloth of the peg table.
(iv)The physical examination of the partially burnt can on which the holy book wrapped in cloth was alleged to have been kept, led to infer that the flame/heal of burning caused by the repeated efforts of burning of the wrapped cloth, must have resulted into the burning of can only at those portions where the cloth was burnt. This confirmed that it was a secondary fire and there was no separate attempt for burning of the can.
(v) The partially burnt cloth, recovered from the second room, alleged to have been covered over the wrapped cloth of the holy book, on examination was found to be synthetic cloth and it had three characteristic singing holes. Since the cloth was synthetic it could be inferred that three separate attempts were made to burn the cloth at three different places resulting into three different singing holes. The recovery of only few burnt match sticks from second room (room No. 2) confirmed the limited attempts and manner of burning.
Besides the aforesaid inferences drawn from the physical examination for corroboration and arriving at significant forensic conclusion, following experiments were carried out in the laboratory to simulate the burning:
(a) A cotton cloth similar to the one involved in the case was wrapped around a book such that all the four corners were at the centre. The wrapped cloth was burnt only near the folds by means of burning match sticks. On unfold-ing the wrapped cloth it was observed that the pattern of burning was similar to the one as observed on the questioned wrapped cloth. Thus, the physical examination coupled with the experiments confirmed beyond doubt that several attempts were made to burn the cloth by making use of repeated fire source of burning match sticks.
(b) The questioned synthetic cloth sent for exa- mination was put to fire by burning stick at three to four places. It was observed that the characteristic holes of singing due to burning match sticks were almost similar to those on the said cloth recovered after the incident, which confirmed the inference drawn on the basis of physical examination.
From the experiments of simulation of scene of occurrence,the photographs of the aforesaid experimentations, observations and plausible reasons it could be possible to reconstruct the scene of occurrence. Thus, the physical examination of evidentiary clues coupled with experimentations to simulate burning and plausible reasons led to significant forensic conclusion that attempt to burn holly book was made by repeated fire source of burning match sticks and not after sprinkling inflammable substances like kerosene oil/petroleum product.
Read other articles by this KKAI Associate:
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| Forensic Scientist, Crime Scene Investigator, Chemistry, Ballistics, Fire and Explosives Expert, Arson Investigator, Forensic Investigation and Analysis Expert, forensic science, trace evidence analysis, chemistry, ballistics, explosives, crime scene analysis and expert witness testimony. Extensive experience in crime scene investigation, investigating, reconstructing, examining and reporting on hundreds of crime scenes for arson & fire, explosions, chemistry, drugs, murder, rape, homicide, and theft. | |
| Resume of WYM | fire, explosion investigator, fire analysis expert consultant |
| Resume of BRZ | forensic scientist, crime scene expert consultant |
| Resume of ZCP | forensic fire expert consultant, arson investigator |
| Resume of TKT | fire, explosion investigation expert consultant |
| Resume of ZRZ | arson investigator, fire cause, origin, expert consultant |
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