Peter Van Geit of the Chennai Trekking Club (CTC), which had organised the ill-fated trekking expedition to the Kurangani Hill in Theni, has filed a petition seeking anticipatory bail before the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Thursday.
Mr. Van Geit, in his petition, said that he had been implicated as the first accused by the Kurangani police, who had registered an FIR under Section 174 of the CrPC, Sections 336 (act endangering life or personal safety of others), 337 (causing hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others), 338 (causing grievous hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) and 304 (2) (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the IPC and Section 21 D of the Tamil Nadu Forest Act, 1882. He claimed that in the original FIR registered by the Bodi Town Police Station based on the information given by an informant named Prabhu, nobody was named as being responsible for the death of the trekkers.
‘CTC, a voluntary body’
The petitioner said that there were two teams that went on an expedition to Kurangani – one from Erode led by informant Prabhu and the other from Chennai led by Arun Prabhakar.
Refuting the allegation that he was the organiser of either of the two groups, Mr. Van Geit said Divya Muthukumar and Nisha Tamiloli had organised the trek for the Chennai team as part of the Women’s Day.
Further, he said that CTC was a voluntary organisation with free membership.
It was registered as a trust by one Prabhakar Meyappan and its main objective was to promote events related to sports and other outdoor activities, health and environment.
Each event is organised by a volunteer based on his/her skills pertaining to managing a team, and participants are informed in advance about the inherent risks in any event. The petitioner claimed that he has no role in the event. He said that he was an avid marathon runner and trekking activist, during his stay in India from 1998 and 2017 when he was employed with CISCO, Chennai.
Mr. Van Geit said that at the time of the event, he was taking part in a marathon event from Chennai to Puducherry, and though he was aware of the trekking expedition, he was not involved in organising it.
He said that he was willing to cooperate with the investigation and would not abscond or evade trial.
Justice G.R.Swaminathan adjourned the case to April 12, and ordered that until then, no action should be initiated against Mr. Van Geit.
Published - April 06, 2018 01:24 am IST
