Tag: Police raid

‘UP Cops Were Drunk and Killed My Wife,’ Says BJP Leader on Uttarakhand Firing Incident

The Jaspur pramukh, alleging serious violations by the Uttar Pradesh police, has demanded a CBI inquiry into the incident, saying, “If I’m at fault then I should be punished but a fair probe should be done.”

New Delhi: Gurtaj Singh Bhullar, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) senior block pramukh from Uttarakhand’s Jaspur, has made a number of serious allegations against the Uttar Pradesh police officers who were involved in the raid in which his wife, Gurpreet Kaur, was killed on October 12.

The BJP leader, speaking to the Indian Express, alleged that the team of Uttar Pradesh police that raided his home were inebriated, did not have a search warrant and came in plain clothes. He also alleged that during an argument, one of the police personnel shot and killed his wife.

Bhullar has demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the matter, saying that he is ready to face the consequences if his guilt is proved through the investigation.

“I am a block pramukh of the BJP. The BJP government is ruling in both the states… If a person like me cannot get justice, what hope remains for a common man?” The Express report quoted him as saying.

The police team had reportedly received a tip-off that one Zafar of the mining mafia, who carries a reward of Rs 50,000 on his head, was hiding at Bhullar’s house near Kashipur in Uttarakhand’s Udham Singh Nagar district.

Initial reports had claimed that Kaur had been killed in a shoot-out that broke out at Bhullar’s home between locals and the police personnel in which the police claimed two officers had sustained injuries.

While five officers are being treated at a hospital in Uttarakhand, two are missing.

The Uttarakhand police had earlier also leveled allegations against the Uttar Pradesh police team, saying that they did not intimate their Uttarakhand counterparts about the raid in advance and that when the Uttarakhand police officers arrived on the scene, they were taken hostage, their weapons snatched.

Further, according to the Express report, an official of the forensic department, after investigating the crime scene, said that they did not find evidence of cross-firing as the Uttar Pradesh police had claimed.

The Uttarakhand police also registered a case against 10-12 personnel of Uttar Pradesh police under Sections 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon), 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence committed in prosecution of common object), 302 (murder), 452 (house-trespass after preparation for hurt, assault or wrongful restraint), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 120-b (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code following a complaint filed by the family of the deceased.

Bhullar’s allegations

Bhullar alleged that 10-12 police officers dressed in plain clothes barged into his house around 6 pm on October 12. According to him, they did not provide a search warrant or any identity proof, there was no woman police officer amongst them, and were intoxicated when they entered the room where Bhullar’s wife and children were and started abusing when the BJP pramukh tried to reason with them.

“One of the policemen had shot her dead near the stairs on the first floor. They fired 3-4 gunshots and one hit her. We rushed my wife to a hospital, where she was declared dead on arrival,” the Express quoted Bhullar as saying.

Also read: Under Adityanath, UP Police Has Injured Over 3,300 in ‘Encounters’, Finds Report

Bhullar also alleged that some of the police officers fled the scene after the gunshots were fired, but they were apprehended by some locals and taken to the Kunda police station. According to him, their car is still there.

He also said that the four police officers who managed to escape from the hospital were caught on CCTV cameras running down the stairs of the hospital and thus, junked the claims that they had sustained injuries, as was being claimed. 

“They knew they had committed a murder and were drunk, and a medical examination at the hospital would have confirmed this. To avoid this, they escaped from the hospital,” he claimed to the newspaper.

Bhullar has alleged that the entire narrative of the Uttar Pradesh police is concocted; he admitted that he met with the accused, Zafar, two weeks prior to the incident when the latter came to him with claims that he was being framed in the mining case, but went on to say that Zafar was not present at Bhullar’s house when the incident took place.

Bhullar is seeking justice for his wife, and has demanded a CBI probe into the incident.

“I want justice. I appeal to the government for a CBI probe. BJP government is there in both states. If I’m at fault then I should be punished but a fair probe should be done,” he told news agency ANI.

‘Woman Dies After Alleged Police Thrashing’: Two Similar Incidents Reported Within a Week in UP

The two incidents were reported in Uttar Pradesh’s Firozabad and Chandauli district, within a span of a week.

New Delhi: Two incidents of alleged thrashing by police during a raid, leading to two individuals’ deaths respectively, were reported in Uttar Pradesh’s Firozabad and Chandauli district, within a span of a week.

On Sunday, May 8, an elderly woman died in Uttar Pradesh’s Firozabad after she was assaulted by a police team at her home, her family members alleged.

They alleged that the 60-year-old woman was “violently shaken” following which she collapsed and died.

The woman’s husband, Fauran Singh, was also admitted to the hospital, apparently due to trauma suffered due to his wife’s sudden death, family members told the news agency PTI.

The police have ordered a probe into the matter.

The woman’s four sons were released from Tundla Jail in Firozabad on Saturday, police said. Police have claimed they were jailed last month after they “attacked their relatives over some dispute.”

Superintendent of police (city) Mukesh Chandra Mishra said, “A police team reached the house of the family under the Pachkhera police station limits on Saturday [May 7] evening to check on the brothers. But an altercation took place between family members and the police team.”

Mishra said the family members alleged that during the altercation, the woman was “violently shaken” by a policeman following which she collapsed and died.

“The body has been taken for postmortem examination,” the officer said.

Also read: Why Police Brutality and Torture Are Endemic in India

A similar incident took place on May 1 in the state’s Chandauli district, where a police team allegedly manhandled two daughters of a sand trader during a raid, leading to the death of one, the Indian Express reported.

According to the report, the alleged incident took place around 4 pm when a police team had gone to Kanhaiya Yadav’s house at Manrajpur village in Chandauli to arrest him after a non-bailable warrant was issued against him.

The police denied the charge, adding that the team did not enter the house as the criminal was not present there. However, the family told Hindustan Times that the team, however, returned later and raided their house.

According to the Indian Express report, a video that went viral showed a woman lying on the floor and alleging that the police thrashed her and her sister. In the video, the family was seen alleging that their daughter died after being “beaten up” by the police team.

Circle officer (Chandauli) Anil Rai alleged that the 22-year-old woman appeared to have died by suicide, the report added.

Chandauli superintendent of police (SP) Ankur Agarwal told Hindustan Times that since the cause of her death was not clear in the post-mortem report, the viscera has been preserved and sent for examination.

When asked about the deceased’s brother alleging that his sister was raped, the Chandauli SP told the daily: “The post-mortem report did not find any external or internal injury on the whole body except a scratch on the throat and minor injury on the left side of the jaw. Still, the swab has been taken and sent to forensic experts for examination. Things will be clear after the swab and viscera report is received.”

Meanwhile, villagers staged a protest and allegedly thrashed head constable, who suffered injuries, the report added, citing the SP.

(With inputs from PTI)

Gorakhpur: Businessman Dies of Injuries Sustained During Police Raid at Hotel

While police maintain that the victim slipped and fell, witnesses allege that he was beaten by the officers.

New Delhi: A 36-year-old Kanpur man died on Tuesday, September 28, following a police “verification drive” in a Gorakhpur hotel, NDTV reported. The police allege that the man died in an “accident” in which he fell over; however, the six police officers involved in the raid have been suspended pending an enquiry into the incident.

The victim, Manish Kumar Gupta, was a real estate businessman and had been sharing the hotel room with two of his friends, Pradeep Chauhan and Hardeep Singh Chauhan, both of whom are from Gurgaon. These two men told the media that they were “business associates” in town to visit a mutual friend.

According to the police, the officers were on a routine verification drive and became suspicious when they found that the three men, who were from different cities, were staying in the hotel under one ID card, the Times of India reported.

Also read: Watch | ‘Why Were UP Police in Such a Hurry to Declare Mahant Narendra Giri’s Death a Suicide?’

The men had apparently come to Gorakhpur on an invitation from a mutual friend, Chandan Saini. The four men had spent the evening in the hotel room after which Saini left, speaking about plans of sightseeing the next day.

According to Hardeep Singh, the police arrived at their room around midnight and asked for identity proof. When he asked them why they had barged into the room at such a late hour, they allegedly slapped him. Singh showed them his Aadhaar card and gave them Saini’s number, after which they woke Gupta to ask him questions.

Singh went on to claim that, when Gupta asked the police why they were disturbing him in the middle of the night, they started beating him, at which point Singh was taken out of the room. He said that Gupta was dragged out of the room a few minutes later, his face bloodied. Singh went on to note that some of the policemen appeared drunk. The police then took Gupta to the hospital where he died.

The police, however, claim that Gupta had been visibly drunk when they arrived at the scene and had thus slipped and sustained fatal injuries to his face. The police also claimed that they had been provided information on “suspicious” men staying at the hotel.

Also read: The Police Did Not Bungle in Assam, They Committed a Horrific Crime

Ravinder Gaud, deputy inspector general (DIG) Gorakhpur, is personally monitoring a probe into the incident on the basis of the witnesses’ statements and a post-mortem report to ascertain the cause of death. “We have not ruled anything out till now,” Gaud told the Times of India.

Vipid Tada, senior superintendent of police Gorakhpur, maintained the police’s account that Gupta had been drunk and sustained his injuries from an accidental slip, yet he suspended the six officers who had been present at the scene. These included J.N. Singh, station house officer of Ramgarhtal station, Akshay Mishra, Phalmandi police post in-charge and four constables.

Shots Fired as Myanmar Journalist Live-streams Police Raid to Detain Him

The ‘Democratic Voice of Burma’ news agency confirmed the detention of Kaung Myat Hlaing in a statement and called for his release.

A Myanmar journalist live-streamed police shooting close to his apartment as they detained him in a crackdown on protesters against military rule.

“Help, help. They’re shooting at me,” Kaung Myat Hlaing, a reporter for the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), can be heard shouting in the video taken in the southern coastal town of Myeik.

The video is shot from a first-floor balcony, where clothes are drying on a line, as police shine a light from the street below and shout at him to come down. There is the sound of someone apparently pulling at the front door and then a puff of smoke appears on the balcony, accompanied by what sounds like gunfire.

The DVB news agency confirmed the detention of Kaung Myat Hlaing in a statement and called for his release as well as the release of other detained journalists.

An officer who answered the telephone at the Myeik Township Police Station said news of the reporter’s detention had not been confirmed and hung up.

Also read: At Least 18 Die in Myanmar on Bloodiest Day of Anti-Coup Protests

Six journalists have been arrested at protests in the main city of Yangon over recent days. They have all been charged under a penal code section making it a crime to publish material that could cause a soldier or other service member “to mutiny or otherwise disregard or fail in his duty”, Tin Zar Oo, a lawyer for an Associated Press journalist among the six, said on Tuesday.

The Associated Press called on Monday for the immediate release of journalist Thein Zaw.

The military overthrew the elected government on February 1, 2021, detaining its leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, and others and unleashing street protests across the country.

The spokesperson for the junta has not addressed the issue of the arrest of journalists in the protests and has not responded to telephone calls from Reuters seeking comment.

Also read: Myanmar Envoy Appeals to UN to End Coup, Police Intensifies Crackdown on Protesters

Many people have taken to live-streaming the protests and, increasingly, police efforts to disperse them.

The DVB said about half a dozen military and police cars surrounded its reporter’s street at about 10:30 pm on Monday, after protests in the town earlier in the day. The DVB said it did not know what kind of guns or rounds were fired, but it believed police were threatening the reporter but not firing at him.

The coup halted Myanmar’s tentative steps towards democracy after nearly 50 years of military rule and has drawn condemnation and sanctions from the United States and other Western countries, and growing concern among its neighbours.

The United States warned Myanmar’s military on Monday that it would take more action if security forces kill unarmed people and attack journalists and activists, which state department spokesperson Ned Price called “abhorrent violence”.

Delhi Riots’ Advocate Mehmood Pracha Blames Amit Shah for Police Raid at His Office

Pracha also claimed that the police has been forcing Muslim victims to withdraw their complaints and charged that a forcibly extracted statement from a complainant was being used to target him.

New Delhi: Hours after the Delhi Police ended a 15-hour raid at his Nizamuddin West office, advocate Mehmood Pracha alleged that the raids were conducted at the behest of Union home minister Amit Shah. Pracha – who has been fighting the cases of a large number of victims of northeast Delhi riots – alleged that he has been trying to establish Shah’s links with the violence.

Pracha also claimed that the police has been forcing many Muslim victims to withdraw their complaints and charged that a forcibly extracted statement under section 164 from a complainant was being used to target him.

Talking to The Wire, Pracha said that during the raid, a team of the Delhi Police Special Cell made a copy of the data from his computer. “They had brought specialised equipment with them and they hacked my computer too.”

He said it was clear to himthat “[home minister] Shah sent them”.

The raid, which began at  12:40 pm on December 24, continued till around 3 am on December 25. It was related to a case in which a Delhi court had asked the Delhi Police to probe allegations that Pracha had “tutored” some victims and witnesses in the Delhi riots case to give “false statements”.

According to the police report, Ali, a victim of the riots, told the police that he was asked to identify an eyewitness named Sharif, a witness in another case, who he allegedly didn’t know.

In his order, additional sessions judge Vinod Yadav had directed the Delhi Police commissioner to issue directions to the special cell or crime branch to probe the allegations against Pracha.

Pracha had denied these allegations saying: “The allegations against me are that a client came to me, and after a few days left because he was disappointed that I wouldn’t do any ‘setting’ for him with the judge or the police – that I only fight the case legally.”

However, in pursuance of the order, Delhi police additional PRO Anil Mittal said, “A criminal case under appropriate sections of law was registered and investigation was taken up.” He added, “During the course of the investigation, search warrants to look for electronic and other evidence from the premises of two members of the Bar were obtained from the court and the same are being executed in a professional manner in Nizamuddin and Yamuna Vihar.”

The search warrant, issued on December 22, read: “This is to authorise and require investigating officer of this case to search for the said incriminating documents and metadata of outbox of email ID… wherever they may be found whether in computer or in the office/premises… including outbox of email ID… as well as other offices/premises where presence of such evidence are detected during the search/investigation, and, if found, to produce the same forthwith before this court.”

However, Pracha alleged, “The real intent was that they wanted to take my hard disk because it contained complaints against the RSS and the BJP with which we would have connected Shah to the northeast Delhi riots. But how could they have taken it. Also, did they expect me to have only one copy of it.”

Pracha said all central agencies were after him. “Be it the IB, NIA – they are all after me. The NIA has questioned me earlier too – but they too couldn’t find anything against me. Shah is after me but I am also after him”, he said, claiming there was a nexus between the minister and   BJP leader Kapil Mishra, widely accused of being a key instigator of the riots.

Also read: As Complaints Go Unprobed, Muslim Riot Victims Accuse Delhi Police of Bias

‘Attack on lawyers’

“The biggest issue here is that this is an action against a lawyer,” he said. He explained that a lawyer cannot be faulted if a client makes a false submission.

“For the sake of argument, if a person goes to a lawyer and says that such and such thing has happened to him and you kindly draft my complaint, or that you file a reply on our behalf to a police notice, then a lawyer would only draft the complaint or reply on the basis of what is disclosed to him. If the information conveyed to the lawyer is incorrect, then will the police proceed against the advocate or the complainant?” he asked.

Also, he said, a lawyer is legally bound to not disclose to a third party what is discussed between him and his client. “I told the raiding team about it. So this is an attack on the lawyer who represents the last bastion that is prepared to take on the powers that be.”

Talking about the present case, he said that a person had approached him to file a complaint on his behalf, or reply to a notice under section 160 or file a statement under section 161 (of CrPC). “Now they [the police] are saying that he [the person] had filed a ‘false complaint’ and he is saying that he did not file this complaint. This is the issue for which over 200 police personnel reached my office and surrounded it. How was this such a big issue?”

Pracha also claimed that Muslim victims of the riots were being forced by the police to withdraw their complaints. “Secondly, they threatened hundreds of people from the Muslim community or filed ‘false cases’ against them to force them to withdraw their complaints [in the northeast Delhi riots cases]. In this case too they threatened him [the person mentioned above] and got a statement recorded under section 164. How difficult is that for the police?” he again asked.

Also, Pracha insisted that there were hundreds of examples of such pressure being mounted on the complainants. “People whose video recordings are there later claimed that no harm came to them, their shops were not looted, because the police scared them. These have been our complaints since the beginning. This is what we have been fighting for. We have also been trying to establish the link between the riots and Shah and we are confident of [proving] that… It is not possible for them to scare me, they can only kill me,” he said.

Pracha said he has full faith in the judicial proceedings and wants people to also retain their faith in the constitution. “We are doing everything through the courts. We want to ensure that ordinary citizens do not lose their faith in the constitution of the country. We want to show that even in such tough times people can get relief from courts. Also we want to send out a message to the weaker sections of the society that no matter how many sections of the judiciary, media or police may get compromised, don’t lose faith in the constitution – our system can still get you justice.”

‘Leading advocates criticise raid’

Meanwhile, a number of advocates have criticised the raids on Pracha. Senior Supreme Court advocate Indira Jaising termed it “a direct attack on the fundamental right to legal representation”.

Supreme Court advocate Karuna Nundy too urged lawyers to stand up for Pracha and tweeted that through the raids the police will get access to a lot of data that’s protected by attorney-client privilege.

Another advocate Rishikesh Kumar, who is an additional standing counsel for the Delhi government, too expressed his anger on Twitter by tweeting: “An office of a lawyer to be raided like this is highly condemnable. The raids on Mahmood Pracha, lawyer for the defence is a direct attack on the fundamental right to legal representation . As a lawyer I strongly condemn this, not acceptable at all.”

Five Militants Blow Themselves up in Police Raid in Bangladesh

Godagari police official Hifzul Alam Munshi said that police surrounded the house at Benipur village early morning after intelligence inputs suggested there were militants present there.

Bangladesh has witnessed an intensified anti-militancy clampdown across the country in recent times. Credit: Reuters/Stringer

Bangladesh has witnessed an intensified anti-militancy clampdown across the country in recent times. Credit: Reuters/Stringer

Dhaka: Five militants from the same family today blew themselves up after stabbing a firefighter to death during a police raid on their hideout in Bangladesh, the latest such incident amid a crackdown on Islamist militants.

The incident took place in Godagari area in Rajshahi district.

Godagari police official Hifzul Alam Munshi said that police surrounded the house at Benipur village early morning after intelligence inputs suggested there were militants present there.

As they tried to storm the hideout at around 8 am, the militants came out and set off the explosions, he said.

Before setting off the blasts, the terror suspects speared a fireman to death. Two policemen have been also injured in the incident.

The fire service men assisting us in the raid died in their suicide blast at the hideout, an official familiar with the development at the police headquarters in Dhaka told PTI.

He added that the operation, launched overnight, was underway as “at least one of them is still trying to resist us from inside”.

The five persons killed in the blasts were the 50-year-old house owner, his 45-year-old wife, 28-year-old daughter and two sons aged 30 and 25.

As the law enforcers were about to approach the house, the suspects came out and attacked officials with sharp weapons, killing a fireman.

Two policemen have been hospitalised with injuries sustained during the attack.

Police rescued two children, who exited the premises before the terror suspects came out.

A woman who was seen sitting on the field outside the house as the raid unfolded, later surrendered. Police said she has been identified as the house owner’s other daughter. She is the mother of the two children  – 8-year-old boy and 3-month-old girl – rescued by police before the blasts, the report said.

Bangladesh witnessed an intensified anti-militancy clampdown across the country as the police headquarters recently circulated a list of nearly 5,000 suspected militants to all district police chiefs.

On Sunday, two suspected militants blew themselves up in “suicide blasts” when security forces raided their hideout.

In March, Bangladeshi police conducted series of large-scale operations against militants, in which at least 17 suspected militants were killed.

On March 31, eight militants blew themselves up with a grenade after the security forces raided their hideout north of the Bangladeshi capital.

Bangladesh has been witnessing a spate of attacks on secular activists, foreigners and religious minorities since 2013. The country launched a massive crackdown on militants, especially after the Dhaka cafe attack.

The ISIS has claimed several attacks in Bangladesh, but the government rejects the presence of foreign terrorist groups in the moderate Muslim-majority country, blaming home-grown groups such as the neo-JMB for terrorist attacks.

(PTI)