Since originally the pleas against police encounters were heard by the division bench of Justice Shah and Justice Patil before they clubbed all the petitions together and ordered that a sessions court judge look into them, a few petitioners are now insisting that the report be first tabled before them (Justice Shah and Justice Patil). But there's a problem - Justice Patil is in Goa for some official work and is not coming back for a while.

Officials at the high court said Justice Patil had gone to Goa on an assignment and that they had no idea when he would return.

The Committee for Protection of Democratic Rights,one of the petitioners that would rather wait for Judge Patil to come back, than let some other high court judge take a look at the report, says the new judge would mean starting from the scratch again. ``It is an issue with wider ramifications.

It does not matter even if it is delayed by another month,'' P A Sebastian, CPDR's lawyer said.

However, the respondents including the counsel for the city police beg to differ. Since the police counsel, Advocate Harshad Ponda was away, his son, Aabad Ponda, also a lawyer, spoke to Express Newsline. ``The division bench had said that the inquiry should not be treated part-heard. Any judge can see the report. We trust all judges and any judge can go through the report,'' he said.

Meanwhile, eight months of probe and now the wait for Judge Patil has had a crippling effect on Mumbai police's fight against criminals. Soon after the probe was instituted on December 10 last year, Mumbai police had stopped encounters and also disbanded its special teams. This,obviously, gave a fillip to the underworld and the gangsters went on a killing spree logging 68 shootouts including 58 killings. Figures on the police side too are telling: for a record number of 70 encounters last year, the police have gunned down only seven gangsters since the petitions began piling up. This year so far only five encounters have taken place. ``The police cannot swing into action unless the high court gives its verdict. Until then everybody will be too afraid to take any initiative,'' said a deputy commissioner of police.

The probe began on February 6 this year and was supposed to be completed within three months, May end, that is. However in May Judge Aguiar sought an extension till June 30 and later sought another one of two weeks. The report was submitted on July 15.