Police `abduct' youth in false dacoity case

Police `abduct' youth in false dacoity case
RAJESH SINHA

JAIPUR, JAN 12: The Madhya Pradesh policemen reportedly picked up a young man from Jaipur last Tuesday without informing the Rajasthan Police and whisked him off to Dabra in Gwalior, in connection with a dacoity case, that has already been proved to be fake.

The operation, which amounted to abduction and for which an FIR was lodged in Jaipur, was carried out in the face of notices from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), intervention by the Rajasthan Chief Minister and a report from the Jaipur SP, upholding the man's innocence.

This rare enthusiasm, shown by police was allegedly at the behest of a Gwalior High Court advocate Sushil Sharma, whose daughter married the man in question, Manoj Tak.

A case was earlier filed with Jaipur Police by Manoj's wife, Anuradha, stating that her husband had been taken away by some men.

According to the Rajasthan unit of Police's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Manoj is now lodged in Dabra jail. As per the PUCL representative who met Manoj, he had bruises and cuts and was crying. A complaint has been sent to the NHRC and chief ministers of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, the PUCL said. It also claimed to have identified three policemen involved in Manoj's abduction as Onkar Singh, Jagat Singh and Ghuraiya.

This was the second time that the Gwalior police struck in Jaipur in connection with this case. In June 1998, soon after the registration of the marriage of Manoj and Anuradha in Jodhpur, they landed in Jaipur, reportedly accompanied by Sushil Sharma, and picked up Manoj's brother, Narendra.

They reportedly took him away on June 6, assuring local police that he was only being taken for questioning. On June 8, they showed him as having been arrested in Gwalior in a dacoity case, that he was alleged to have committed on June 4. He was kept in custody till July 23, 1998, when he was released on bail, after his family filed a habeas corpus petition in the Rajasthan HC.

Meanwhile, Narendra's father was allegedly persuaded by Sushil Sharma, who came to Jaipur on July 23, 1998, to withdraw the habeas corpus writ, with an assurance that the case against his son would be dropped.

Narendra petitioned the NHRC, which sought a report from Jaipur SP Saurabh Srivastav. Anuradha reportedly told Srivastav that Narendra was implicated in a false case and that all this was being done at the instance of her father, who had great influence in Gwalior. The SP allegedly reported that while Narendra was in Jaipur at his work place (a jeweller's shop), Manoj was on a honeymoon in Mount Abu during the period that the alleged dacoity was said to have been committed. Srivastav stated in his report that the case was concocted and the two brothers had been falsely implicated by the Gwalior police.

The harassed couple has also approached the chief ministers of both the states. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot was reported to have written to the Madhya Pradesh Government about the matter.

Undeterred, the Gwalior police filed a charge-sheet in Dabra court in March 1999, complaining that the Jaipur SP was not cooperating with them. Last Tuesday, they took away Manoj at gun-point from his office in Jaipur. Manoj was reportedly lodged in jail at Dabra, with the PUCL trying to obtain his release on bail.