Deepak Joshi and Prashant Nakhwe, lensmen from The Indian Express and Mid-Day respectively, discovered this to their horror after being brutally assaulted by Government Railway Police (GRP) constables on Kalyan station. Their crime? Catching the railway cops in the act of accepting bribes from passengers to board an unreserved compartment at 11 pm on Wednesday night.

For over an hour and a half they were savagely beaten with lathis and kicked in the face, back and abdomen by three unrelenting railway cops. Prashant suffered from corneal haemorrhage after a lathi was thrust into his right eye while Deepak injured his left ear and sustained bruises on his face.

The battered journalists were later thrown into a dingy lock-up without access to either a phone or medical care until 6.00 am when they were ejected from the station.

According to Deepak, the two photographers wholive in Kalyan and Dombivli respectively, were returning home when they noticed the huge queue and a lathi-wielding plainclothesman collecting money on platform 4 & 5 on Kalyan station.

The passengers were waiting in a queue to board the general compartment of the Gorakhpur-bound Kushinagar Express.

``It was a great action picture and we crossed over to click it,'' pointed out Deepak who added, ``no sooner had Prashant clicked the first frame than an RPF constable (now identified as B S Tangare) demanded to know who he was.'' Nakhwe pulled out his ID but the constable did not even bother to look and began slapping and punching Nakhwe whose camera was smashed on the ground.

An alarmed Deepak ran to the ticket checker's cabin nearby. ``I was trying to locate a familiar TC to help us out but none of those present there were known to me,'' he said. Tangare dragged the bruised Nakwe by the scruff of his collar to the TC room and seeing Deepak he began slapping him for trying to ``slip away.''

Tangare thenproceeded to beat them for over an hour with intermittent breaks when he tired off. ``I told him I would report him to his superiors,'' recalls Prashant, ``but he was enraged and thrust a lathi into my eye. I'm glad I saw it coming and put out a hand, otherwise he would have blinded me on the spot.''

However, the corneal bleeding has left him with a blood clot inside the eye. Doctors at the Thane Civil Hospital say that further tests are needed to determine whether the vision in his affected eye will return to normal.

``After he handed us over to the GRP I felt they would see our point and we tried to plead with them,'' said Deepak. But this only brought on a fresh barrage of violence as the GRP constables S N Kamble (buckle no. 132) and RE Kamble (buckle no. 1215) began kicking them around. They were brought to the GRP police station at around 12.45 am, taken to the lock-up and beaten with lathis again on the neck and back.

``We just crouched in foetal positions on the floor, not wanting the blows tohit us in our abdomen and face and kept crying out but they went on hitting us,'' points out Deepak. ``I thought I would never leave the station alive.''

Around 6.00 am they were asked to leave but not before both Kambles had warned them of dire consequences if they dared make any complaints against them. ``We have your addresses and you'll never be able to live in Kalyan again,'' was their ominous warning.

The entries in the station diary, the crime register, the version both Kambles told the GRP IG S Chakravarthy and the version they told Express Newsline just don't match. Both SN Kamble and RE Kamble insist they had only brought both photographers to the police station from the platform.

They were involved in a fracas aboard the Kurla-Bangalore Express and the RPF handed them over to us, SN Kamble said but could not say why this detail had been omitted in the complaint registered by them. He also denied having threatened the two photographers while they were leaving.

A GRP cover-up alreadyseems to be underway to protect the guilty. Even as the last reports came in, Kalyan railway police have consistenly refused to file an FIR in the case. According to ACP B B Mohite: ``The statements of the two photographers will be used as FIRs as and when necessary.'' However, he refused to provide a complaint number.

Even though a departmental enquiry is underway, the maximum punishment prescribed for the accused, if found guilty, is dismissal from service. An FIR can be lodged immediately when there is prima facie evidence of assault. But it also takes the matter to court where the guilty could be tried as common criminals. Apparently, police do not see it fit to allow things to come to such a pass.

Different police authorities, different versions

Station Diary VersionBoth Deepak and Prashant were nabbed for `breach of social peace' under Section 110 & 117 of the Bombay Police Act when they were fighting and physically attacking each other!

The crime register version: Deepakand Prashant (both of whom are incidentally teetotallers) were drunk and were standing on the tracks to disrupt rail traffic!

What both Kambles told the IG: Both photographers were beaten up by the passengers on the platform as they were clicking photographs without their consent. The GRP intervened to save them and took them to the police station!

What both Kambles told Express Newsline: B R Tangare thought they were ISI agents and began beating them and in their fright they could not come out with proof of identification or plausible explanations of why they were clicking pictures. We merely took them to the police station.

What the IG Chakravarthy told Express Newsline: It is obvious that the constables have been more than high-handed in their behaviour. A departmental enquiry has been initiated against them and they will face disciplinary action if found guilty. A TC told me he had recognised Joshi even while he was being beaten up in his cabin. There was no reasonto beat them even after they were identified as presspersons. The enquiry will be completed by tomorrow.