The BJP and Delhi Police's Hand in the Delhi Violence
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reportage ishan tankha 20 THE CARAVAN reportage CRIME and PREJUDICEThe BJP and Delhi Police’s hand in the Delhi violence COVER STORY / POLITICS PRABHJIT SINGH AND ARSHU JOHN {ONE} shadab alam began his day as usual on 24 February 2020. He woke up at his house in Old Mustafabad, in northeast Delhi, where he had been living for more than half a decade, and left by 10 am for Samrat Medical Store, on Wazirabad Road, near Brijpuri Chowk. He had worked at the pharmacy for many years, and it was his job to open it every morning. The previous afternoon, the Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kapil Mishra had delivered an incendiary speech near the Jaffrabad metro station, a few kilometres away. Hundreds of women were staging a sit-in at the station to protest the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, passed last year by the Nar- endra Modi government, and the proposed National Register of Citizens. A wave of demonstrations against the CAA and NRC had swept Delhi and the country, led largely by Mus- lims who understood their place in the Indian republic to be threatened by the initiatives. The BJP and other Hindutva groups had vilified the protesters, and in numerous places the demonstrations were met with intimidation and violence. Mishra, with the deputy commissioner of police for northeast Delhi standing beside him, declared that if the Delhi Police did not clear the protests at Jaffrabad and neighbouring Chand Bagh, “we will have to come out on the street.” SEPTEMBER 2020 21 crime and prejudice · reportage Alam knew there had been attacks four of his employees. Besides Alam, Ghai was told to come to the police against Muslims in the area the previ- two of the others, Naved and Aqib, were station in nearby Dayalpur to seek their ous night following Mishra’s speech, Muslims. release. He went that day, and on each but he did not think things would esca- A short while later, a group of police- of the next three days, to no effect. In late further. He worked for a few hours men appeared at a gate that connected his affidavit, submitted with Alam’s at the shop, then left for the afternoon to a neighbouring terrace, and tried bail plea, Ghai wrote, “The police offi- prayer at a mosque in the Kasab Pura to climb over it to where Ghai and his cials neither informed about the reason area. Before he headed back, a friend employees were. As soon as he allowed for Shadab’s detention nor provided shahid tantray for the caravan shahid tantray “When we told the police officials that we needed any information about when he would be released.” Alam’s brother also went to urinate, they would tell us to do it inside the cell to the station numerous times, but he itself,” Shadab Alam said. “We saw others being could do no better. Alam remained in custody at the thrashed while being taken to the bathroom, so Dayalpur police station for four nights, after that none of us would ask.” with 23 other Muslim men picked up from various parts of northeast Delhi. told him over the phone that Muslims them to enter, Ghai later recorded in a “The first night, some policemen came; were being attacked again. Alam took sworn affidavit, the police began round- they asked our names and kept beating a longer route to the pharmacy than ing up the Muslim men. While Ghai us as they did,” Alam said. “They were usual, and returned at around 3 pm. pleaded that his employees had been drunk. They beat us a lot.” There was soon loud shouting in the at work, and had not been involved in The men were not allowed to use the area, and passersby warned of ap- any violence, he noticed that Alam and bathroom. “When we told the police proaching trouble. Anurag Ghai, who Naved were no longer on the terrace. officials that we needed to urinate, owns the pharmacy, shut the shop and He rushed downstairs in time to see the they would tell us to do it inside the cell climbed to the terrace above it with police taking the men away in a van. itself,” Alam said. “We saw others being 22 THE CARAVAN crime and prejudice · reportage thrashed while being taken to the bathroom, so that had been burnt down near Sherpur Chowk, in previous spread: after that none of us would ask.” Khajuri Khas, during the communal violence on During and after The abuse had a clear communal colour. Alam the night of 23 February. It did not name a single the February said the men were forced to chant “Jai Shri Ram”— specific perpetrator. The second, FIR Number 58 violence in Delhi, an overwhelming Hail Lord Ram. At night, he recalled, drunk of 2020, referred only to the violence in general, amount of evidence policemen beating the men boasted about the and also did not accuse anyone by name. The nine emerged to show number of Muslims they had shot that day. remaining men were arrested in connection to the complicity and Mohammed Razi, a resident of Dayalpur, was this document. According to the lawyer, the police participation of the also among the detainees. He was picked up at “were not clear on the names that had to be divid- Delhi Police. around 2.30 pm on 24 February, he later told us, ed into the two FIRs” even when the detainees on his way home from work. “A policeman asked arrived in court. opposite page: Policemen from my name and then hit me with his baton, instruct- Despite claiming that the men had been arrest- the Dayalpur ing me to sit in the police vehicle,” Razi said. “The ed just that day, the police did not want to question police station are police picked up more Muslim boys on way to the them further: the police asked the court to send accused of illegally police station, where we reached at around 4.30 pm.” the men to judicial custody, not to police custody, detaining and Razi, too, described custodial torture that lasted where they could be interrogated. torturing two dozen four consecutive nights. “They hit us so badly they The magistrate Richa Manchanda was not per- Muslim men inside the station premises broke two of their batons on the very first night,” suaded that the men should be released. Manchan- between 24 and 28 Razi said. “They beat us with belts, and I was da passed almost identical orders in the two cases February. asked to urinate on a room heater.” The heater had arising from the two FIRs, and sent the men to an exposed electric coil, and Razi feared that uri- judicial custody till 13 March. nating on it would mean electrocuting his genitals. When accusing the police of custodial torture, “I kept standing silently, prepared in my mind for the lawyers had asked for an immediate medical more thrashing,” he said. Ultimately, the police did examination of the detained men. The police not force him to do it. objected, claiming that they had already been Indian criminal procedure unequivocally pro- examined. Manchanda agreed to the lawyers’ re- hibits the police from detaining anyone for more quest, and the men were examined upon arrival at than 24 hours without producing them before a Delhi’s Mandoli Central Jail. Alam’s examination magistrate. A team of lawyers contacted by the revealed “large bruises on back and buttocks,” and men’s families approached the courts, and on 28 “injury marks on Lt thigh, on Rt thigh upper and February, a magistrate directed the Dayalpur po- buttock.” lice station to account for them. The police finally Even when they were produced in court, the produced the detained men in court later that day. men did not know what crimes they had been ac- The magistrate also directed that the lawyers cused of. “We did not get anything that was being be allowed to meet the men at the station. Five of discussed,” Razi said. It was only after arriving at the 24 detainees had already been taken to court the jail that Razi learnt he had been booked under when the lawyers arrived, but the others, includ- FIR 58. Alam was booked under FIR 57. ing Alam and Razi, were still in lock-up. “We were Alam’s lawyers filed his first bail application shocked to see their condition,” one of the lawyers on 11 March. It included his account of custodial said. “They were stinking, many sat motionless on torture and medical proof of his injuries, as well the floor in the lockup.” as the sworn affidavit from Ghai, backed by CCTV According to the lawyers, the Delhi Police footage from the pharmacy and terrace to corrob- booked the first five detainees taken to the court orate his account of Alam’s detention four days under the Arms Act, which regulates weapon- before the police claimed he was arrested. “It is a ry. The court sent them to judicial custody. The matter of record that the FIR does not contain the lawyers were not at the court when the five were name or any details of any of the alleged accused presented, but they were in attendance when the giving the police a free hand to pick and choose remaining 19 men were produced. The lawyers as to whom they want to arrest,” the application accused the police of custodial torture, which the noted. police denied. The police also denied that the men Hukum Singh, the investigating officer in the had been held in illegal custody, past the 24-hour case, filed a reply on behalf of the Delhi Police.