Custodial Carnage- Barbaric devil in uniform

‘Police is your friend’- proclaims a banner prominently placed outside a police station. But, what an ordinary citizen thinks, expecting police to be friendly would be too much and let them at least treat the common man as a human being. 

Two men, father aged 58 years and his son aged 31 years were arrested by the Sathankulam police for allegedly violating lockdown norms on business hours by their mobile phone shop, died at a hospital in Kovilpatti on June 23, 2020. Relatives alleged that the policemen had severely beaten and manhandled them at the Sathankulam police station, Tamil Nadu. 

Initially two policemen were suspended and others were transferred. The state government had awarded compensation of 10 lakh to the family of the victims. When the news of the police torture sparked a state-wide outrage, the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu was forced to transfer the probe to CBI. On June 29, 2020, the Madras High Court cleared the decks for a CBI probe into the custodial death of the father-son duo in Tuticorin. 

What sends shock waves across the country is that the victims were no criminals. They were simple law abiding people. What was their crime? They had just kept their shop open beyond the cut-off time. Their shop could have been sealed. Can the police be so cruel towards peaceful citizens? There is a legitimate question in the minds of every citizen of this country - Who has given such brute powers to these blood-thirsty beasts in uniform? 

Statistics placed by the home ministry before the Rajya Sabha showed that India recorded a total of 1,674 custodial deaths- 1,530 in judicial custody and 144 in police custody, between 1 April 2017 and 28 February 2018. 

A report by a consortium of NGOs against custodial torture have published a report which claims that 1731 people died in custody in India during 2019. This works out to around five custodial deaths a day. 

India has shown a distressing growth in custodial deaths, rising from about four deaths per day to a total of 14,231 in the 10 years between 2001 and 2010 to five custodial deaths per day in 2017-18. 

Custodial deaths reported in India increased by 9% from 92 in 2016 to 100 in 2017, as per National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data. Andhra Pradesh reported the most deaths 27, followed by Maharashtra 15 and Gujarat 10 in 2017. These three states accounted for more than half of all custodial / lockup deaths reported. 

It is a known fact that torture and indiscriminate beating up of suspects to extract confessions are very much part of archaic policing methods in India. Policemen who employ these barbaric inhuman methods go scot-free and are rarely punished. In some exceptionally brutal cases, they are just transferred to another place. Even the judiciary had made a stinging remark that the devilish policemen were so confident that they would never be held accountable even if the victim died in the custody and even if the bitter truth about the brutality was revealed.

In 2006, the Supreme Court of India ruled that each state should set up a police complaints authority wherein any citizen can lodge complaint against the police officers for any misdemeanour. The truth is, this ruling hasn’t been complied by many states. 

Health and safety of any arrested person in custody is the prime responsibility of police. Police must be made accountable and answerable for every custodial death. Every custodial death and every case of torture is to be condemned, and investigated thoroughly. Suitable timely actions are to be initiated on the findings to make this mechanism effective and to become a deterrent. 

National Human Rights Commission of India has hence laid down strict guidelines to be followed after custodial deaths. The guideline mandates a judicial inquiry, to be conducted when a person dies in custody to look into the cause of death and the circumstances that led to the death. Police are to report a custodial death to the National Human Rights Commission within 24 hours of its occurrence, which in turn lead to other accountability measures such as a videographed post-mortem. These are meant for providing safeguard against excessive force or illegality in police custody. 

‘We have zero-tolerance against extra-judicial deaths, police atrocities but we should also concentrate equally on terrorism because that’s the biggest attack against the human rights,’ Amit Shah, Union Home Minister, said addressing the 26^th foundation day of celebrations of the National Human Rights Commission in Delhi on October 12, 2019. 

Amit Shah went on further to say, ‘It is our responsibility that not a single person should die in police custody needlessly or a person should be a victim of extrajudicial killing. But we will also have to provide facilities for every person to live with dignity.’ 

It is only hoped that the above pronouncements would not remain only mere rhetoric to suit a particular occasion, and forgotten subsequently like many other earlier assurances. It is now the responsibility of National Human Rights Commission to ensure that our honourable Home Minister walks his talks.    

Coming back to the present case of custodial death at Tuticorin, what should be the action taken to stem the rot and usher in a sense of accountability and human policing among the policemen? Handing over the investigation to an independent agency like CBI is the first step in the right direction. Going further, all the involved policemen shall be charged for committing murder. Investigation shall be concluded within a specific time frame and all the guilty shall be punished.

Dr. C K Sreedharan

Website- www.sreedharanck.com