Varapuzha custodial death: Human rights panel wants murder case against cops

Kochi: P. Mohandas, acting chairman of the State Human Rights Commission (SHRC), on Thursday said the medical reports have ‘confirmed’ police brutality as the reason behind the death of S.R. Sreejith, 26, of Varapuzha. He has directed the Special Investigation Team to find out the accused cops who assaulted the youth and book them with murder charges.

As part of its investigation, the commission visited the Varapuzha police station where Sreejith was kept in custody for more than 24 hours and examined the documents relating to his arrest. According to him, an examination of the medical certificate issued by the medical officer, government hospital, North Paravur, suggested that Sreejith was subjected to brutal torture under police custody.

“Sreejith was taken into custody on Friday night and he had no major health problems when produced at the government hospital on Saturday morning. He was kept in police custody until he was admitted to a private hospital on Sunday morning in a critical condition. This suggests that Sreejith sustained the injuries while under police custody,” the commission said and added that the statements given by the witnesses too corroborated this.

In its order, the commission directed the SIT to find out the police officers who assaulted Sreejith. Mr Mohandas further pointed out that Sreejith was not part of the group that attacked Vasudevan’s house at Devaswompadam on Friday noon.
Meanwhile, the commission registered a suo motu case on the report that as many as 1,129 police officers in the state are accused in various criminal cases and issued direction to initiate action against them as per section 86 of the Kerala Police Act. He also sought a report to this effect from the home secretary and the director-general of police within 30 days.