In Gandhi’s Champaran, a suffering dalit family struggles to register a police case
Victim Vinod Ram has alleged he and other members of his family are on the run as the police are favouring their tormentors and pressuring them to reach a compromise with the opposite party.
At a time when Bihar is celebrating the centenary of Gandhi’s ‘Champaran satyagrah’ of 1917, a family belonging to the scheduled caste category, to which the mahatma referred as ‘Harijans’, or God’s chosen ones, is struggling to register a police case against those subjecting it to “atrocities”.
A member of the victim Dalit family has told HT its bid to register a case against a tormenting co-villager, enjoying money and muscle power, has brought it untold hardship, allegedly because of the police bias in favour of the opposite party in the dispute.
In a complaint filed in the court of the chief judicial magistrate (CJM) of Motihari, Vinod Ram of Chargaha village under Turkaulia police station of East Champaran district in north Bihar, has alleged he and his family members have not been able to register a police case for torture and molestation from the aggressor party.
Ram has claimed persons owing allegiance to the village strongman molested and thrashed his minor sister, on May 8, and threatened to release video clips of her on the social media, to pressure him to withdraw a complaint he had filed earlier at the SC/ST police station at Motihari, under the SC & ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
To make things worse, the Turkaulia police did not register a case filed on the statement of the minor victim.
“The Turkaulia police refused to accept the statement of the victim, recorded by police at the Motihari sadar hospital where the minor was being treated (moved to Patna medical college hospital since then), after being referred there from the Turkaulia primary health center, on May 8”, Ram said in his complaint.
Ram told media persons on Saturday that the police had also overlooked the order of Motihari CJM, who, on May 16, asked the Turkaulia SHO to submit to the court the records concerned to know under what circumstances the complaint of the minor victim was not registered.
Ram claimed that on May 17, after the instruction of CJM reached in Turkaulia police station, SHO Dharmendra Kumar, picked up his septuagenarian grand father, suffering from chronic disease of kidney, his father and mother, around 12 noon and tortured them to “get their thumb impression on blank paper”, in lock up.
“They were let off around 10 pm with a warning that the case(s) be withdrawn”, he added.
Ram , who, like his sister, was also under treatment at PMCH, said his family had left the village out of fear, as both, the aggressor party and the police, were threatening them to reach a compromise.
Reached for his comment, SHO Dharmendra Kumar disconnected the line saying he was on leave.
However, the investigating officer of the case, Arun Kumar Chaudhary, admitted that the FIR of the minor victim had not been registered. “This is because the accused persons have assured us that they are about to reach a compromise with the complainants”, he told HT.
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