Assam: Last week, 21-year-old Biki Ali and 38-year-old Rajesh Munda were shot dead by the Assam Police. Both were rape accused, killed within a day of their arrest. The police claimed they were trying to flee custody when they were shot.
At least 35 people have now been killed in police shootings since the Bharatiya Janata Party returned to power in Assam in May 2021, with Himanta Biswa Sarma at the helm. In December, Scroll.in had examined police records and found 20 of 30 people killed until then belonged to the state’s ethnic and religious minorities. The latest killings continue this trend: Ali was a Muslim, and Munda, an Adivasi.
On March 15, shortly before the two men were shot dead, Sarma defended police action in the state assembly and denied that specific communities were targeted. The number of cases registered in January and February had fallen by 30% compared to the same period last year, Sarma said, and the police’s tough stand against criminals was working.
“The fall in crime rate shows that the police action against criminals has worked,” Sarma said. “We have been criticised in the House repeatedly for the encounters. Nobody supports the encounters. Police have to work within the law. But while working within the law, if a bullet hits a rapist, we must be clear whether we should sympathise with the rapist or the victim.”
After news of the two killings spread across Assam, GP Singh, special director general of police, law and order, took to Twitter to thank Sarma for his “crystal clear directions” on how to tackle rape cases.
Singh appeared to be taking a cue from Sarma, who has made several statements endorsing police shootouts over the past year. Amid growing consternation that the police in Assam have grown trigger-happy, the government continues to signal that such shootings have political backing.
In most cases, the police have claimed they opened fire in self-defence or to prevent the prisoner from escaping.
Biki Ali, accused of raping a 15-year-old girl, was shot in Guwahati. “He was taken to the crime scene on Tuesday night to locate others accused in the rape cases,” said Nabaneet Mahanta, deputy commissioner of police, Guwahahti (West). “Ali snatched the service revolver of officer in-charge Twinkle Goswami and fired two rounds at the police team, which resulted in police firing back at him. Two police personnel were also injured.”
Rajesh Munda was accused of raping and killing an seven-year-old girl in a tea garden in Udalguri district. GP Singh told the press he was being taken back to the tea garden to reconstruct the crime scene when he tried to escape from the police vehicle. That was when the police opened fire, fatally injuring him, Singh said.
In a string of tweets, Singh insisted police action had been within the ambit of the law, even as social media users pointed out “encounters” could not be the legal procedure to deal with rape and ensure justice, and that the accused had to go through judicial trial.
Singh suggested such actions were, in fact, necessary. He quoted a verse from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita, in which Krishna counsels Arjuna, who is assailed by doubt on the brink of Mahabharata war. “If I ceased to perform prescribed actions, all these worlds would perish,” the verse tweeted by Singh said. “I would be responsible for the pandemonium
