4 min readAhmedabadOct 7, 2025 05:00 AM IST
First published on: Oct 7, 2025 at 05:00 AM IST
TWO PERSONS, including a police constable, were booked in connection with the alleged torture of a teenaged youth – a minor belonging to another community – at a police station in Rajkot, officers said on Monday.
The action comes two days after a video surfaced on social media purportedly showing a man sitting on a chair, holding a youth by his hair, and pulling out handfuls of it and throwing it in a dustbin, laughing as the youth pleads with him to stop. The man was later identified as a sanitation worker, police said. The video was allegedly filmed at a police station in Rajkot by a constable posted there, police said.
The two have been booked under BNS sections 115(2) (voluntarily causing hurt), 198 (willfully disobeying a law to cause injury) and 54 (abettor present), as well as section 75 (cruelty to a child) of the Juvenile Justice Act.
The alleged incident took place last month, after the youth was booked in a case of assault and detained by the police.
The FIR in the case, registered on the basis of a complaint by the youth’s grandmother, mentioned that he had been detained by the police in connection with a “fight” that left one person injured in an alleged knife attack. He was later sent to a juvenile remand home and released after 16-17 days, it said.
While the youth did not immediately reveal his ordeal to his grandmother, it came to light a few days ago when the video surfaced online. The FIR says that the youth subsequently told his grandmother what transpired at the police station on the night he was detained.
Mujahid Nafees of the Minority Coordination Committee (MCC) wrote to Gujarat DGP Vikas Sahay regarding the issue and the application was forwarded to Rajkot Police Commissioner Brajesh Kumar Jha.
Meanwhile, with the help of community leaders in Rajkot, the youth’s grandmother also submitted a written application to the Police Commissioner. This application named the constable and the sanitation worker, apart from a police inspector and an assistant commissioner of police (ACP). However, the FIR names only two persons as the accused.
According to sources close to the youth’s family, the police showed them “convincing evidence” that neither the Inspector nor the ACP were present at the police station at the time of the incident, leading to the allegations against them being dropped from the FIR.
Rajkot City Police Commissioner Brajesh Kumar Jha was unavailable for comment. DCP Zone-2 Rakesh Desai told The Indian Express, “In the case of the video of a minor whose hair is being pulled out, his grandmother has given a complaint and we have filed an FIR. The accused police constable has been transferred to headquarters and the sanitation worker has been removed from the job.”
When asked about the inspector and ACP being named in the original application to the CP but not in the FIR, DCP Desai said, “Our inquiry has found that they were not involved.”
Subsequently, the inquiry was handed over to ACP (West) Radhika Bharai. Speaking to the Indian Express, ACP Bharai said that while she is conducting the preliminary inquiry and has taken statements of all involved, with a final report to be submitted shortly, the FIR will be investigated by a Police Sub-Inspector of a separate police chowki under the police station concerned.
This is the second such incident of alleged police torture against a minor youth within a month in Gujarat. On September 13, four constables were booked for the alleged torture of a teenaged minor over several days in August. A petition in this case was earlier filed in the Supreme Court and is currently listed in the Gujarat High Court. The hearing of this petition, which was listed for Monday, did not take place, said the youth’s lawyer.
The alleged incident took place last month, after the youth was booked in a case of assault and detained by the police 
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