Other States - Orissa

People’s tribunal observes abuse of power by police

BHUBANESWAR: A People’s Tribunal on Torture (PTT) has found that police personnel in Orissa are frequently abusing power vested in them when a common man comes to police station for filing a complaint.

“More often than not, police officers use their power over general diary entries, complaints and FIRs to exercise control over victims and survivors. Empowered to draft and to file grievances, they can and often do employ the threat of false charges to induce victims to act in a particular way,” PTT’s jury said while addressing a press conference here on Wednesday.

The interim observations of the jury, comprising nine eminent persons from divergent fields, were compiled on basis of a hearing of at least 30 cases relating to police torture held here on Tuesday.

When victims or survivors defied such a blatant abuse of power, the threat of false charges often became a reality, the jury said.

Chaired by former Orissa High Court judge Justice P. K Mishra, the jury has Sankar Sen, former director general of National Human Rights Commission, A. B Tripathy, former rapportier, NHRC, Pratibha Ray, well-known litterateur and Asha Hans, professor of department of women’s studies, Utkal University, as its members.

The PTT was a part of National Project on Preventing Torture in India and torture cases from five districts were heard.

“Very often in registering the complaint, police are sometimes guided by extraneous factors.

And in most cases, victims are left in the dark about the progress of investigation,” the interim observations of the jury said.

It expressed particular indignation at those cases where the police failed to pursue an investigation despite direct court orders to do so. Such conduct must be considered contempt of court.

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