Chandigarh, March 6 -- The Punjab and Haryana high court on Thursday directed the Punjab director general of police (DGP) to submit an affidavit detailing circumstances around the death of a 19-year-old youth in an encounter in Gurdaspur on February 25. "We can't shut our eyes (to the questions being raised around the encounters)," observed the bench of justice Anupinder Singh Grewal and justice Deepak Manchanda, as amicus curiae in the case, Tanu Bedi, read out reports around encounter killings in Punjab and submitting that there appeared to be a pattern to these incidents. The bench had taken suo motu note of the incident on Thursday morning and summoned the DGP, Gaurav Yadav, in the afternoon hearing through the video-conferencing. Appearing before the court, the DGP stated that mandatory procedure and national human rights guidelines had been followed meticulously in the case at hand, and the chief judicial magistrate had already taken cognisance of the matter and passed certain directions. An SIT had also been constituted, the DGP informed the court. To this, the court responded that the material placed before it suggested the deceased youth was around 19 years old and had no criminal antecedents. "We will give you time to respond. You have to satisfy us. We will take further course of action only after response from you," the bench told the DGP while seeking an affidavit by March 17. The court expressed its concern over similarities between encounters taking place in the state and said questions were being raised on the "rule of law" since in the case at hand the deceased had no criminal record. "You may catch them, but you cannot take the law totally into your hands. They have to be dealt with in accordance with law," the court observed. Earlier, the amicus curiae had informed the court that as per media reports 35 encounters have taken place in the recent past and there were similarities in the manner in which they took place. Appearing for the state, senior advocate Puneet Bali listed out the steps being taken by the state to strengthen policing and accountability. A new transfer policy for the police force above the rank of an inspector has been finalised and has been sent for cabinet approval. It was further informed that 500 patrolling vehicles have been added to strengthen ground-level policing and additional manpower is being deployed for patrolling duties. About one acre of land in Mohali has been earmarked for the establishment of a facility to strengthen emergency response system. The high court on Thursday also sought response from the Punjab government on a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by lawyer Nikhil Saraf demanding details of the total number of accused who were either killed or grievously hurt (by being shot in the legs) while escaping from police custody in Punjab over the last two years. There has been a surge in the unconstitutional and illegal cases of extra judicial encounters/ killings in different districts of Punjab, by the officials of Punjab Police, said the plea, seeking that CBI be tasked with the probe into all such cases over the last two years. The plea further sought details about the disciplinary action taken against all officials from whose custody accused managed to escape in such cases. Details have also been sought regarding promotions given to all police officials involved in encounters where the accused was either killed/grievously injured while escaping police custody in the last two years. The high court bench of chief justice Sheel Nagu and justice Sanjiv Berry has sought the government response by April 7. Meanwhile, mother of the deceased, Ranjit Singh, has approached the high court seeking directions to constitute a special investigation team under the supervision of a sitting or retired judge, having all judicial members, and to hand over the probe to CBI. "..there exists strong apprehension that the deceased died during illegal custodial interrogation; or the alleged encounter was staged to justify the death by fabricating a narrative of self-defence. It was fabricated just to establish a chain of incidences to make the whole suspense-drama film story into real incidents," says the plea of the mother, Sukhwinder Kaur. It has yet to be taken up by the HC....