EXAMPLE III

Baldey Singh, son of Jagir Singh, resident of village Shahpur under police station, Beas, District Amritsar, was picked up by a team of policemen led by Inspector Mohinder Singh, Station House Officer of Mehta Chowk police station in Amritsar, on 18 April 1989. Malkiat Singh brother of Baldev Singh found out in early June 89 that Inspector Mohinder Singh was detaining his brother for interrogation in a private house belonging to the head of the village council near Mehta Chowk. He filed a petition mentioning this fact and praying for a Writ of Habeas Corpus (No. 1777/89) for the production of his brother on 4 June 1989. Justice N.C. Jain who heard the petition appointed a warrant officer and when on 6 June 89 this warrant officer reached the house in which Malkiat Singh believed his brother to be confined, he found the house locked from outside. The warrant officer then went to the police station Mehta Chowk which was situated 100 yards from the house and informed Assistant Sub Inspector Rajinder Singh and Head Constable Charanjit Singh about the purpose of his visit and about the order of the High Court to search for Baldev Singh. The police officials refused to cooperate with the warrant officer. He then went back to the locked house and asked Malkiat Singh to climb up the roof of the house and call out loud for Baldev Singh. A voice was heard coming from inside the house in response. The lock of the house was broken. Inside the house there was a room which was also locked from outside. This lock too was broken. Baldev Singh was found in the room lying on the floor. He was unable to get up and was lifted by Malkiat Singh, his brother and Kuldeep Singh, his brother in law.

The warrant officer went back with them to the police station Mehta Chowk. There Inspector Mohinder Singh told the warrant officer that Baldev Singh was not required in connection with any case and that had never been in his custody. Malkiat Singh and Kuldeep Singh hired a Maruti van and took Baldev Singh to Chandigarh to get him admitted in a hospital. Hospitals in Chandigarh refused to admit him without orders from a court. They went to Amar Singh Chahal, a lawyer who told them that 7 June was a court holiday and that the High Court could be moved only the day after. He further advised them to keep Baldev Singh in a safe place until the High Court issued instructions for his hospitalization.

They took him to the house of a relative, No. 136, Phase II of Mohali. His brother, Malkiat Singh, stayed with him. Kuldeep Singh his brother in law left for his village in the Maruti van which had been hired to bring Baldey Singh to Chandigarh. Kuldeep Singh was intercepted by Inspector Mohinder Singh on the Grand Trunk road and was compelled to reveal where Baldev Singh was. The Inspector instructed one of the Head Constables in his team to take Kuldeep Singh into custody and he himself went to the House No. 136, Phase II of Mohali in the Maruti van. He then took both Baldev Singh and Malkiat Singh into his custody. He forced them to get into the same Maruti van in which they had come to Chandigarh and drove away with them. Near Kharar, in Ropar district, Mohinder Singh asked Malkiat Singh to get down from the van and drove away with Baldev Singh.

In an affidavit, dated 8 June 89, filed before the High Court, Malkiat Singh stated all these details: The whereabouts of Baldev Singh remained unknown for the next two months. On 9 August Jagir Singh, Baldev Singh’s father, filed a petition in the High Court giving the information that Baldev Singh was in the custody of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) unit stationed at a Public Works Department rest house in Ramdas (in district Amritsar), Responding to this petition (No 2624/89) the High Court once again appointed a warrant officer, Gian Singh, to go and search for the detainee at the rest house mentioned in the petition. The warrant officer found the detainee at the rest house when he went there on 10 August. The CRPF officials denied knowledge about the circumstances and the reasons for his detention and told him to inquire from the Ramdas police station which was located near the rest house,

Warrant officer Gian Singh went to the police station where he was asked to contact officers of the Police Station, Mehta Chowk. He went to police post at Mehta Chowk where he found out that no case had been registered against Baldev Singh. He went away after telling Inspector Mohinder Singh that the High Court had ordered Baldev Singh’s production in the court on 11 August 89. Baldev Singh was not produced on 11 August but on 25th when the High Court ordered his release.

Baldev Singh’s brother in law, Kuldeep Singh, was untraced since 6 June when on his way from Chandigarh to Shahpur he had been intercepted by Inspector Mohinder Singh. Malkiat Singh found out where Kuldeep Singh was being detained after two months. He filed another petition (No. 2623/89). The High Court once again appointed a warrant officer, R.L Bhatia who reached the Canal Rest House near Bheowal, the suspected place of detention on 10 August and found Kuldeep Singh in one of the rooms inside the rest house, handcuffed and in a very weak state. Kuldeep Singh told the officer of the court that he had been held there for the last two months. Assistant Sub Inspector Jasvinder Singh who was present in the rest house informed him that there was no case registered against Kuldeep Singh. He then went to police station at Mehta Chowk where he was told that a case of apprehension of breach of peace was registered against Kuldeep the same day under section 107/151 of Code of Criminal Procedure in Daily Dairy No. 8 at | p.m. It was the last entry made in the diary before the arrival of the warrant officer. Surely, misdemeanor of the police officers was established in this case indubitably through a judicial process calling for their exemplary punishment. However, no action has so far been initiated against them either departmentally or judicially.

The policy of repression in Punjab has been followed with the impunity and the insurmountalbility which the three examples cited above illustrate. On 1 February 1990 when a delegation consisting of members of several liberties organizations, including the Committee for Information and Initiative on Punjab, met the Governor of Punjab to demand dismantling of the repressive machinery of the State, punishment of the officials responsible for grave violations of human rights annulment of the black laws etc he responded by telling them that he would act to redress their grievances if they offered him concrete and documented examples of State excesses. In this report we are offering concrete and documented evidence of excesses which violate fundamental human rights to life and liberty and which need to be redressed immediately.

The cases documented in the following pages of this report pertain to illegal abduction and prolonged illegal custody of individuals by the security agencies who have neither been produced before any court nor have been shown killed in encounters. Some of them might be still alive in the custody of the police or other security agencies. Release of those alive must immediately be secured. If any of them has died in custody the families should be informed and exemplary damages must be paid. In all cases the officials responsible for the crimes must be removed from office and prosecuted without delay. Most importantly care must be taken that the responsible officials in their anxiety to cover their tracks do not exterminate or injure the detainees or harass their families. The government must also, without delay, institute impartial judicial inquiry into all other cases of disappearances and custodial deaths. Widespread abuse of fundamental human rights in Punjab has resulted from abrogation of safeguards against arbitrary deprivation of life and liberty customary in Indian law which must be without delay and restored absolutely. Independent judicial inquiry into all cases of death in custody including in “encounters” is mandatory under section 176 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. This mandatory requirement under the law has either been completely ignored or has been vitiated with executive Magistrates ordered to carry out the inquiries. Judicial determination of the circumstances of these deaths require procedures which cannot be influenced by executive compulsions and must, therefore be carried out only by judicial magistrates, The government must also ensure that all other legal safeguards against arbitrary arrest, torture and extra-judicial executions are without delay restored in the state. No person should be detained without the reasons, the place, the time of detention and the identity of the officials affecting it and the law applied being recorded. When a person is taken into custody the place of his or her detention must immediately be communicated to the families and lawyers who must also be allowed access to detainees under the law. Detainees must be medically examined before the commencement of their interrogation and before their transfer to judicial custody. They must be produced before a magistrate within 24 hours of their arrest as is mandatory under the law. The police agencies must be made, not only, to maintain records, accessible to all, of all persons being held in — detention but must also be made to publish lists of such persons who may be wanted by them for interrogation or detention, together with the charges against them.

Only by following these safeguards against abuse of police power would it be possible to prevent grave violations of human rights in the future.

Ram Narayan Kumar

Nitya Ramakrishnan

Gopal

Ashok Agrwaal

Tapan Bose

(New Delhi, 8 February 1990)

Article extracted from this publication >> May 11, 1990