Delhi Police routinely torture Bengali-speaking Muslims just to make money
New Delhi: Even after being scolded by a Delhi court on February 9, for scripting a fake encounter, the Delhi Police is not ready to mend its ways. Another case of police terror against poor, helpless and vulnerable minorities came to the fore yesterday. This time it’s the issue of illegal “Bangladeshis,” another favorite topic for Delhi police after encounter (read fake encounter).
Rani, daughter of Razia from Barpeta district of Assam, was forcibly taken away by four men in plain clothes in a gypsy van at around 6 am on 10th Feb when she was about to enter the house of Dr. Lalitha Pillai in Maharani Bagh area, near Jamia Nagar. She works there as a domestic worker. The moment the policemen in plain clothe told her that she was a Bangladeshi and she will be deported in an hour, Rani was shocked as she is a genuine Indian citizen and resident of Delhi since she was born 23 years back. She holds voter ID, bank account and ration card. The gypsy stopped at the police station of Rohini Sector-11, about 20 kms from Maharani Bagh.
The moment, Rani who lives in a shanty in Taimoor Nagar locality populated by Muslims from Assam, entered the police station, to her utter fear, she found 5 men including one of her neighbours, being brutally beaten by the policemen. They were beating them with hand, leg, stick and everything they laid their hands on. Policemen were telling them, “declare to us that you are Bangladeshis.”
Sasar Shaikh showing the swelling onhis body parts after Delhi police's beating
Now the policemen turned to Rani and told her that “it would be better if you declare it yourself that you are a Bangladeshi,” some thing which she strongly refused to do. “Then they started beating those men all the more and asked their women staff to start hitting me and give me electric shock, something which made me shudder in fear,” recalled Rani. Known to be an assertive woman among her circle, Rani categorically told the policemen that she is very much Indian and she would produce all the documents to substantiate her claims. She informed them that she had voter ID, bank account and ration card.
“In spite of all those documents which are made through money and which we will tear any way, you are a Bangladeshi and you should very well remember this fact,” replied one policeman after her refusal to be categorized as a Bangladeshi.
“In the meantime, beating of those five men continued. It had made me afraid like hell,” added Rani, a standard VI dropout of an MCD school. After some time they called up at my home and threatened my family members that, “she is a Bangladeshi and if within one hour you won’t submit her documents to police station Rohini, sector-11 , then she will be deported back to from where she has infiltrated to India.”
“My husband and my mother and my entire family got worried and scared like hell. Immediately they turned up in the police station with all of my documents. But now they started asking me for the proof of my children which we of course didn’t have,” added Rani.
“My documents didn’t suffice their curiosity because they were looking for money. So now they started asking for 5 thousand rupees, otherwise they repeated their threats of packing me to Bangladesh,” recalled Rani whom Rohini police let go at around 1 PM, only after she gave them Rs 1750, all that she had.
The entire experience was so torturous and she was so much overtaken by fear that she was vomiting all the way back home.
Proof of Rani being an Indian, her voter ID card and ration card
When this correspondent talked to Rohini police about it, they rejected that police was harassing Muslims from Assam and claimed that it was routine check up of “illegal Bangladeshis.”
But when TwoCircles.net asked the policeman on line that how come Maharani Bagh came under the jurisdiction of Rohini police, he kept the phone down saying that in these matters, the issue of jurisdiction doesn’t come.
In many ways Rani was lucky that she was born as woman because her neighbor from the same vicinity, Sasar Shaikh was beaten brutally in the police custody. It took a lot of convincing and persuasion before he came on camera and showed TwoCircles.net his body parts which were swollen because of the merciless beating.
“They were not listening to me. They were just beating me with every thing they laid their hands on continuously for 9 hours, from 6 in the morning till 3 in the evening,” said Shaikh who has been living in the Taimoor Nagar slum for more than 20 years and he has all the documentary evidences to prove that he is very much an Indian. He has the voter ID card of Delhi, a bank account, a pan card and the ration card of Taimoor Nagar.
“I don’t know how we will live when police takes away from us our hard earned money, the meager sum of Rs 5 thousand,” added Shaikh who had to give two thousand in lieu of his freedom in spite of showing the police all documentary evidences he had.
“Delhi police says that ‘be our ears and eyes. How can we become their eyes and ears when Delhi police itself cuts our ears and eyes?” questioned Rani with worry running throughout her mind that how she will manage her home after she gave every thing she had to police to save herself from being deported as a Bangladeshi.
Delhi Police routinely torture Bengali-speaking Muslims just to make money
