Police Encounters: Justice Served or Justice Denied?

Image source:https://www.deccanherald.com/specials/insight/goonda-raj-turns-encounter-raj-in-uttar-pradesh-759857.html

On the evening of November 17, 2019, a veterinary doctor, Disha, left home for her clinic in Gachibowli, Telangana. After parking her motorcycle near a toll plaza, she travelled the rest of the distance by cab. When she returned to find the rear tyre of her motorcycle punctured, she called her sister to explain that she had accepted the help of some truck workers to fix the problem. Six minutes later, the call was cut. The woman’s phone was switched off. A week later, her body was recovered, raped and burnt, from an underpass on National Highway 44.

When the police took four suspects into custody the next day, the public expected a long-drawn out trial hampered by bureaucracy and corruption, justice delayed and therefore denied. But justice, if it can be called that, was served much sooner. On December 6, the police disclosed the result of a “reenactment” of the crime conducted at Chatanpally: an altercation during which ten policemen killed all four suspects.

While the people of Telangana hailed the police as heroes for ridding the state of these alleged rapists, a Supreme Court-appointed inquiry into the killing yielded different opinions this May. The (Sirpukar) commission reported that the police’s assertion that they had fired in self-defence after the accused tried to escape was “unbelievable, and not backed by evidence” and recommended that the ten policemen present be tried for murder.

The situation as it stands today rekindles a debate that simmers only in the hearths of Indian homes: that of the morality of a fake encounter. So let’s settle this dispute by using the aforementioned example and asking ourselves these questions: why do fake encounters take place? What are their consequences, positive and negative? What consequences would arise from their absence? And together, our answers should tell us - is an encounter case ever justified?

Let’s start simply, with the why of the scenario. If anything about this case is clear-cut, it’s that the suspects were shot because they raped and murdered another human being. Under the reasonable assumption that they were guilty of this crime, what punishment did they deserve?

According to Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, a murder must check off the three factors (intention to cause death, knowledge that the act may cause the death of another, and intent to cause such bodily injury as is likely to cause death) to warrant life imprisonment, and possibly even the death penalty at the court’s discretion. Combined with the rape of their victim, a crime so outrageous would undoubtedly have been punished with death… if the criminals weren’t minors.

Three out of the four rapists being children, two of them only 15 years old, their sentence would likely be much milder. Take the Nirbhaya case, when a 23-year-old woman died after five adult men and a minor brutally raped her in a bus in 2012. Four of the adults were sentenced to death, the fifth having died in prison, but the minor? Being 17 at the time, he was released after a mere three year stint in jail. The Juvenile Justice Act has since been modified, allowing for 16 to 18-year-olds charged with Heinous Offences to be tried as adults. Of course, this wouldn’t have made a difference to the fate of the two previously discussed 15-year-old delinquents.

While you and I undoubtedly want all four of these monsters to die a thousand deaths, we must resign ourselves to the fact that the punishment they received was harsher than at least two of them legally deserved.

So why did ten ordinary policemen feel the need to take such drastic action? “The Sirpurkar Commission is categorical that their actions have the stamp of approval of the government,” reports The Wire. “The legally puerile tactics they adopted in producing, manipulating and frustrating the process of inquiry reflect this approval.” The policemen had nothing to gain from an encounter killing; in all likelihood, they staged one under pressure from a local politician. Perhaps this politician had enough influence over lower courts to protect the policemen from sentencing there. But however flawed this debate may prove our justice system to be, our Supreme Court remains beyond the reach of bribery or extortion: once the case escalated to the notice of our highest tribunal, the politician likely cut their losses and left ten misguided policemen to the bleak fate they face today. All that mattered to the politician, anyway, was the temporary appeasement of their voting population, the Telangana public: because the Telangana public was apoplectic.

In 2020, Telangana reported the highest number of atrocities against women among the southern states. In 2021, the state’s rape rate shot up by 23%; and this count includes only the few reported incidents. The people’s fear and frustration culminated after the Disha case, with schoolgirls and elderly women alike flooding the streets to protest with the fervour of a people long denied justice and ready to fight for it.

If not for the police encounter, though, would they have received it?

Likely not. Data released by the National Crime Records Bureau of India (NCRB) in 2020 showed that over 75% of cases involving crimes against women in Telangana were still pending trial. Another 10,000 from the previous year were awaiting a mere preliminary investigation. The public’s response may have temporarily placed the Disha case under a spotlight, but this light would have soon faded with the next case of male violence, swallowed up by a new wave of victims screaming in vain for justice. And so, in the only plausible turn of events in which Disha’s assault would be avenged, the police took matters into their own hands.

While few may care for the rapists whom they killed, this event’s consequences reach further than the deaths of four brutes. The policemen’s ability to shoot four suspects dead in broad daylight, and their belief that they could get away with it, is evidence of a broader problem India faces. Across the country, members of the police force have repeatedly been driven by our overburdened, understaffed and consequently inefficient law system to administer justice themselves. Daya Nayak, Prafule Bhosale, Pradeep Sharma: these men have become household names for their proficiency in carrying out and covering up extrajudicial killings. “So what?” A regular Indian might ask. “Why should we stop them from providing justice to victims and preventing further victimisation of civilians?”

Because when we let a falsified encounter slide, we allow an ordinary person to play god. We give extra-human power to someone with very human flaws. How long until these flaws lead them to abuse their power? Take Sachin Vaze, for one. Assistant Police Inspector in the Mumbai Police, he played a role in the deaths of 63 alleged criminals through encounter cases. He was suspended for 17 years after the custodial death of Khwaja Yunus, but granted bail and reinstated in 2017. In 2021, he was dismissed permanently from the police force, this time for his involvement in the Antilla Bomb Scare and the murder of Mansukh Hiren. Countless such examples have proved, time and time again, that encounter specialists are as dangerous a solution to crime, as crime itself.

What, then, would the proper solution to a case like Disha’s be? I hoped that by the time I got around to writing this portion of my article, I would have an answer for you. Unfortunately, hours of pondering have left me with none. My education and - albeit basic - understanding of civics teach me to look forward to the conviction and punishment of ten policemen who brazenly trespassed upon the law. But as a girl, as an Indian, as a halfway decent human being - and I am sure most of my readers will agree with me - I applaud our police’s actions and pray that they do not face their consequences. I celebrate the deaths of four rapists, and hope that they burn in hell.