Assam: SP convicted for custodial torture; injecting petrol into man’s rectum

GUWAHATI, June 22, 2018: Goalpara superintendent of police Amitava Sinha was convicted by a sessions court on Thursday for allegedly torturing an accused in police custody.

Additional district and sessions judge number 1, Kamrup (metro), Dipak Changkakati convicted Sinha under Section 330 of the IPC (voluntarily causing hurt to extort confession) and sentenced him to undergo imprisonment for two years.

Sinha was also ordered to pay a fine of Rs 50,000, in default of which he shall have to undergo imprisonment for another three months.

Sinha's lawyer Angshuman Bora said after the court pronounced the order, they filed an application to allow his client to go on bail to appeal before Gauhati High Court, challenging the sessions court order, and their prayer was allowed by the court.

The Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) empowers a court, which passes the conviction, to release the convicted person on bail if he is sentenced to an imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years for presenting an appeal.

Gurmeet Singh, an accused in a murder case registered at Basistha police station, had filed a criminal case against Sinha, accusing him of custodial torture and wrongful confinement for the purpose of extorting confession in 2013. Gurmeet, a truck driver, is a resident of Bhour Camp area under Satwari police station in Jammu.

Sinha was then the additional superintendent of police (crime) of Guwahati police.

Gurmeet was represented in the court by senior advocate A. K. Bhuyan.

Sinha had filed a prayer before Gauhati High Court in 2014 for quashing of the proceedings against him on the ground, among others, that the allegations brought against him were false and concocted.

However, the high court, in June 2015, dismissed his petition and directed him to appear before the trial court.

Gurmeet was arrested in Jammu and Kashmir in June 2013 in case number 771/2012 registered at Basistha police station in connection with the murder of a businessman, Ajit Singh, at Basistha Chariali area of the city on November 29, 2012.

He was brought to the city from Jammu on transit remand and produced before the court of chief judicial magistrate here on June 17, 2013, and remanded to police custody for eight days for interrogation.

Gurmeet said Sinha had subjected him to third degree torture on June 17 and 18, 2013, during police custody, which included beating him up with a hockey stick that left him with a fractured upper arm and injecting petrol into his body through the rectum.

He also alleged that Sinha had had uttered abusive language with racial slur.

Sinha had denied the allegations.

TNT with The Telegraph inputs