CHANDIGARH: In order to hush up the misdeeds of their colleagues, senior Punjab police officials have given themselves a clean slate in what has come to be known as the “watery grave scandal,” The report on the probe, which was ordered by the State Home Department and conducted by the Crime Branch of the State police, has failed to deny any of the cases mentioned by The Pioneer in its report,” Watery graves for Punjab militants,” which was published in the issues dated March 26 & 27. There port stopped short of confirming the recovery of the bodies.
On the other hand, it mentions two cases where four human bodies, some with their hands and feet tied, were fished out of Punjab irrigation canals after the story broke, This lends credence to the fact that bodies of suspected militants or their sympathizers continue to be thrown into the canals by the State police to destroy any evidence about their identity.
Contrived encounters and the use of extra-judicial methods are common knowledge; both to the Government and the people, but the State police had no choice but to conduct a mock probe. The non-seriousness of the enquiry was evident when the police, rather than a magistrate, was asked to investigate, Secondly, the police department, in a vague communication to district headquarters, asked senior superintendents of police (SSPs) to report on the existence of dead bodies if any, from the canals in their jurisdiction without specifying the period for which the information was being sought. Most of the district police chiefs, except two, responded by reporting; “Nil bodies recovered.” The Police Superintendent of those districts where the bodies were reported to have been recovered did not deny what had been mentioned in the newspaper report.
Though the Home Department had asked the police to specifically examine each case and verify the authenticity of the report, the findings of the crime department do not touch upon what was reported by this newspaper. Rather, it dug out two hitherto unknown cases.
As part of the probe, the Inspector-General of Police (Crime) had asked all the SSPs to report if they saw any dead bodies in their jurisdiction. Except for Machhiwara police station in Khanna police district and Bassi Pathana police station in the newly formed Fategarh district, no police station reported the sighting of any dead body.
Even the SSP of Sangrur reportedly turned a blind eye to the existence of any dead bodies in this district. It may be mentioned that the officer in-charge of the Amargarh police station in Sangrur district had earlier told The Pioneer about the recovery of some bodies by the policemen from Mohrana bridge on the Nabha-Malerkotla road.
This probe report submitted to the Punjab Home Department by the police says that two dead bodies were recovered from the canal passing through the Machhiwara police jurisdiction.
These bodies were identified as those of Mohinder Singh and Bhadur Singh, both residents of Sanghera village falling under the same police station.
According to this police report, investigations and blood trails revealed that these two were shot outside the canal and later thrown into it.
According to the police version, the deceased were taxi operators who may have been done to death by two unknown persons who had hired their vehicle from Sangrur to go to the Christian Medical College, Ludhiana,
The police report is, however, silent on the postmortem findings and further progress in this case, even though the incident took place over a month ago.
Article extracted from this publication >> May 15, 1992
