Mumbai’s skewed encounter record

Policemen like Pradeep Sharma,Daya Nayak,Sachin Vaze,Prafful Bhosale,Vijay Salaskar and Ravindra Angre saw a meteoric rise in their careers during this period.

Still,the National Crime Records Bureau reflects zero cases of fake encounter against the Maharashtra Police. The Ramnarayan Gupta encounter is the first case in Mumbai,in fact,in which policemen have been convicted. Even in this case though,the main accused,the aforementioned Pradeep Sharma,was acquitted.

While the pattern of Mumbai’s police encounters raised serious questions from rights activists,all that the officials have faced so far is suspension and dismissal. The biggest reason is that contrary to regulation,the inquiries into encounters were conducted by teams who were part of the same police jurisdiction as the accused,allowing plenty of scope to bend the law. The Ramnarayan Gupta encounter was a joint operation of D N Nagar and Versova police stations,and the inquiry was conducted by the same stations for almost a week.

As per the Bombay Police Manual,the state is also mandated to launch an inquiry within 48 hours of a police firing (in case of injury,fatal injury or if more than five rounds of bullets have been fired) headed by a magistrate. However,the Mumbai police generally handed over the probes to an executive magistrate or a special land acquisition officer (SLAO) or a city deputy collector,that too after a significant lapse of time. A judicial magistrate can try criminal cases and pass a verdict,whereas an executive magistrate cannot pass a judgment.

Take the case of Ramnarayan Gupta. The SLAO initiated the inquiry in June 2007,eight months after he was killed. It concurred with the police that “they returned fire after being shot at”. It was the dogged pursuit for justice by Gupta’s lawyer brother Ramprasad that resulted in the conviction.

While Mumbai has turned a corner,with almost no encounter killings reported now,Friday’s judgment shows Maharashtra needs a re-look at its extrajudicial killings for a closure to this chequered past.