NHRC notice to Gujarat DGP over teen minor’s ‘custodial torture’

This incident came to light after a video surfaced online purportedly showing a man sitting on a chair, holding a boy writing in pain, by his hair, and pulling out handfuls of it and throwing it in a dustbin, laughing as the boy pleaded with him to stop.

The man was later identified as a sanitation worker employed at the police station, police said. The video was allegedly filmed at a police station in Rajkot by a constable posted there, police said.

The two were 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, police had said on Monday.

This was 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, in Botad district. A petition in this case was earlier filed in the Supreme Court and is currently listed in the Gujarat High Court.

However, The Indian Express has learnt that no action has been taken yet by the NHRC in the Botad case wherein a complaint had been filed on September 10 in connection with the alleged torture of another youth – also a minor – at a police station in Botad district in August. The minor boy was hospitalised for several days in Ahmedabad, and an FIR was registered against four police personnel in Botad.

When The Indian Express checked the status of the Botad case on the NHRC website, it said “No Action Taken”.

This matter had been raised in a complaint by an activist, Mujahid Nafees of the Minority Coordination Committee (MCC), on September 10, almost a month before the Rajkot incident came to light.

Nafees said on Tuesday that he had earlier written to Gujarat DGP Vikas Sahay, flagging both the incidents.

“There are several such incidents taking place in Gujarat but the number of suo motu cognizance cases by the national commissions is low. This is a morale boost for those involved in illegal activities. There should be a special officer of the NHRC in Gujarat who can take cognizance of such matters,” he told The Indian Express.