Thiruvananthapuram: The district police chief (Thiruvananthapuram rural) has ordered a probe against police officials, including Varkala sub-inspector, after the local correspondent of a Malayalam daily was roughed up at his house on Sunday night. The journalist identified as Sajeev Gopalan, the Varkala correspondent of Kerala Kaumudi, claimed that he was attacked over a few stories he had done in the past. Attingal ASP R. Aditya recorded the statement of the scribe and started a probe. The attack happened around 10 p.m. when he was seeing off some guests who had come home. Two police officers questioned him as to what five people were doing inside his house at that time.
When he said that he was a journalist, the cops roughed him up. Later, station house officer K.R. Biju reached the scene and questioned him over a new story that he had done in the past. The officers allegedly broke the flowerpots in the house and roughed up Mr Gopalan before his wife and children. They took away a neighbour named Ramjith for trying to intervene.
Meanwhile, the police officials claimed that they had gone to the house after noticing drunken revelry in front of the house. When they questioned the act, the gang of five allegedly hurled verbal abuse at the cops. “While three of them ran away, we managed to take Ramjith into custody. Mr Gopalan was not taken into his custody because his wife guarded him and we had no women constables with us,” the official added. The Varkala police have also registered a case under section 332 (voluntarily causing hurt to deter public servant from his duty). The district committee of Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) protested against the attack and sent a letter to state police chief demanding action against officials.
