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Attacked by traffic cops, U.P. woman police officer gets justice after 14 yrs
A Bareilly court convicts four accused, including three traffic cops, for attacking her when she caught them extorting money from truck drivers in 2010
Over 14 years after an attack on a senior woman police officer, a court in Uttar Pradesh’s Bareilly on Friday convicted three traffic constables and their aide of attempt to murder, said prosecution and police officials on Saturday.
The court ordered the arrest of the four, who were out of jail on bail, and fixed Monday (February 24) as next date for pronouncing the quantum of punishment, said special public prosecutor Manoj Bajpai while talking to media persons. He said the prosecution will demand strictest punishment for them all to avert such incidents in future.
Bajpai said the trial of the case was going on in the court of Special Judge, Suresh Kumar Gupta of Anti-Corruption Court-I. The special judge convicted former traffic police constables Ravendra Kumar alias Tiger, Manoj Kumar alias Sultan, Ravindra Singh and their close aide Dharmendra Kumar, who was a tempo driver.
The case dates back to 2010, when Kalpana Saxena, the then ASP, Traffic, Bareilly, received information regarding constables extorting money from truck drivers. After being elevated to the DIG rank, she is currently posted as additional commissioner of police, Ghaziabad.
Saxena, a 1990 batch Provincial Police Service officer who was given 2010 batch of State Police Service cadre of IPS after her promotion, said it was around 6.30 pm on September 2, 2010, when she spotted the three constables involved in extorting money from truck drivers.
“Multiple complaints of extorting money from truck drivers by traffic cops were being received those days and senior police officers also held a meeting to stop this menace. All traffic police personnel were also warned about it but these three constables continued extorting money from truck drivers at Natkatia intersection on Bareilly-Lucknow highway,” the woman cop said while recalling the incident.
“When I got a tip-off about their corrupt activities, I reached there in civvies along with my gunner to caught them red-handed,” she added. They misbehaved with her too when she intervened, the cop said as they could not identity her.
“As they tried to escape in a private car, they dragged me for almost 300 metres when I tried to stop them. They even hit me hard on the head and pushed me when the car slowed down after which they fled leaving me injured. I suffered severe injuries, including a fracture in one of my hands, and was rushed to a hospital by my subordinates,” she added.
As per her, the traffic constables’ aide Dharmendra Kumar was arrested from the spot while three constables were arrested after 3-4 days as she had lodged an FIR against them with the Cantonment police station.
Another police official said the three constables were suspended after the incident and later dismissed from services. However, they were reinstated after getting relief from the high court, the police official claimed. He said the trio was terminated again in December 2021 after they were found guilty following an inquiry.
