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The team included the former director-general of police of Tripura state, K. S. Subramanian; Sumit Chakravartty, the editor of Mainstream magazine; Kavita Srivastava, the national secretary of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties; and Vasundhara Jairath of the Delhi Solidarity Group.
During their stay, they met Y. Joykumar Singh, the director-general of police, and expressed their concern about the number of extrajudicial executions reported from the state. Singh informed the team that in the past 10 months the police had killed over 260 persons in the state and that each of them was a terrorist, killed in an encounter with security forces.
This statement by the most senior police officer in the state defies common sense. Simple mathematics shows that an average of 26 persons was killed in the state each month. The statement raises important questions. On the basis of what evidence did the police come to the conclusion that each of these persons was a terrorist? And who gave the police the authority to kill suspects?
The fact is that many victims who fall prey to police gunfire are killed for reasons beyond security operations. For instance, on July 23, the Manipur State Commando Force killed two people in the capital Imphal in broad daylight. One was a young man and the other a woman, seven months pregnant and on her way to the hospital with her two-year-old son.
The man was killed after he was seen publicly talking with police officers. He was led into a nearby medical store and shot. The body was brought out, but not before the police officers, in full public view, placed a 9-millimeter pistol beside the body.
Hearing the shot, people ran for cover. The officers opened fire at the crowd, hitting the woman. Yet the police as well as the state's chief minister declared that the two persons killed in this incident were members of underground groups operating in the state. In fact, the chief minister made the statement in the Legislative Assembly.
This event pushed the state into pandemonium. Massive protests paralyzed life for weeks. Schools were closed and remain closed even today. The government responded with a crackdown, arresting leaders of the protest movement and charging them under draconian laws like the National Security Act, which delays the possibility of bail. With the leaders in jail under false charges, the protest movement faded.
As a result, as in hundreds of other cases, the police killed people whose families are now forced to live with the shame of being branded by the government as related to a terrorist. There are no enquiries or investigations into such cases, and those who press for an investigation are detained in prison.
The families are denied even the slightest possibility of finding the truth behind such incidents. Worse still, the officers who carry out the murders are promoted and in many cases are awarded with medals.
This rampant impunity and spreading of lies are exploited by extremists as well as police officers. While extremists and security agencies kill at will those whom they think are informers, the police have taken the situation to a different level by engaging in murder for robbery. Trusted sources within the police department say that one in every five murders is carried out by police officers after robbing the victim.
The situation in the state has deteriorated to such an extent that anyone carrying a costly mobile phone or exiting from a bank after withdrawing money is a potential target. Many police officers are openly engaged in looting, extortion and murder. It is common knowledge in the state that for sums as little as 10,000 rupees (US$214) one can hire a police officer that is willing to kill innocent and unsuspecting persons.
The situation in Manipur is an extreme example in India of the breakdown of the rule of law. It is also the result of the government’s continuing neglect to address deep corruption within the political as well as the administrative setup.
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(Bijo Francis is a human rights lawyer currently working with the Asian Legal Resource Center in Hong Kong. He is responsible for the South Asia desk at the center. Francis has practiced law for more than a decade and holds an advanced master's degree in human rights law.)
