Bhopal: From late-night raids to routine seizures across villages miles apart, the same individuals appeared to be present everywhere. Allegations of “omnipresent” police witnesses in Madhya Pradesh’s Mauganj district have escalated into a major controversy after scrutiny of digital crime records showed that six individuals were repeatedly cited as government witnesses in hundreds of cases registered at Laur and Naigadhi police stations.
The pattern emerged from FIRs accessed through the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS), a project of the Union home ministry, which revealed the same names recurring across case after case.
At the centre of the controversy is Jagdish Singh Thakur, the former in-charge of Naigadhi and Laur police stations. An RTI activist has accused him of misusing his position by registering over 150 questionable FIRs and repeatedly citing a set of favoured individuals as witnesses to legitimise police action on paper and facilitate corruption.
One of the six individuals, Amit Kushwaha, cited as a witness in hundreds of cases, allegedly accompanied Thakur even when the officer was transferred. The complainant, activist Kunj Bihari Tiwari, first approached the police with his allegations in 2022 and filed a fresh, detailed complaint in December 2025, submitting what he described as documentary proof.
‘We were not witnesses’, say those named
Following the complaint, Mauganj SP Dilip Soni removed Thakur from his post as Naigadhi police station in-charge on Sunday. “The complaint is being examined in detail. The complainant has shared information about 145 FIRs with common witnesses,” Soni told TOI, adding that this was one of the factors behind the decision.
Several individuals named as witnesses have now distanced themselves from the cases. Dinesh Kushwaha, a vegetable vendor, said: “I signed as a witness in only one or two cases where I was present. Police wrote my name in many other cases without my knowledge.” Another person, Rahul Vishwakarma, a driver, said he often signed papers after accused persons were brought to the police station. “I was not present during the action, and I did not act as a witness in so many cases,” he said.
Tiwari, however, claimed the issue runs deeper. “I examined FIRs for more than a year and found around 200 cases with common names. When I checked older records going back to 2000, I found similar names appearing in about 1,000 FIRs. I am also a victim — I was framed in a case by the same officer,” he alleged.
An examination of over 40 FIR copies accessed by TOI showed the same names repeatedly listed as witnesses in unrelated cases. Police officials said an inquiry is underway to determine whether legal procedures were violated and whether disciplinary or criminal action is warranted.
