Advocates Write to Chief Justice of MP High Court Seeking Probe in Police Brutality Committed Against Farmer Couple
July 20, 2020, MondayAnjana GopinathThree Advocates of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, Shoeb Hasan Khan, Ankit Agrawal and Saurabh Sahni have written to the Chief Justice, pleading to him for taking cognizance of police brutality committed against a farmer couple in Guna, as they tried to commit suicide after officials of the revenue department bulldozed their crops in an encroachment drive.
The incident had taken place on the 14th of July, 2020. The police officials state that the couple had encroached upon the 5.5-acre land which was reserved for construction of a post-graduate government college. Ramkumar Ahirwar, the husband, had pleaded with the officials that the land was taken on lease and that he has also taken a loan to cultivate crops on the land. He had also informed them that they would have no option but to end their lives if the crops are destroyed. After the couple consumed pesticide for committing suicide, they along with their relatives were booked by the police for trying to obstruct public officials on duty.
The advocates, in their letter, have written that “in the disturbing videos which are widely under circulation, the husband and the wife can be seen being assaulted by the police officers as they dragged them into an ambulance.” The letter also mentions the incident which occurred on March 23, wherein a lawyer was brutally assaulted by the police while he was on his way to the hospital for treatment, for the sole reason that he was suspected to be a Muslim. The lawyers state in their letter that “such handedness of the police and brutality of police is completely traumatizing the faith of common man in the Rule of Law.”
The lawyers, through their letter, have sought a judicial probe under the supervision of a retired HC judge in the “interest of justice and fairness”, and also a fair compensation to be awarded to the couple and their relatives for the brutality committed against them by the police.
