annual report print final.qxd - Asian Centre for Human Rights

INDIA HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT 2005 Punjab
alleged that the police forced a
compromise and immediately thereafter
beat him up in drunken condition. He had
to be admitted in the Civil Hospital,
Jagraon. 41
The police and the Punjab Vigilance
Bureau personnel allegedly harassed the
family members of Jaskaran Singh, whose
petition in the Punjab and Haryana High
Court led to the quashing of illegal
selection of seven Deputy Superintendent
of Police, including sons of the Chief
Minister’s media advisor B I S Chahal and
Ferozepur Senior Superintendent of Police
Harinder Singh Chahal on 15 October
2004. 42 Ever since Jaskaran’s filed the
petition with the Punjab and Haryana High
Court, police started harassing his elderly
parents and younger brother Balkaran
Singh in Bhagsar village of Muktsar. On 8
October 2004, the Vigilance department
registered a false case at Ferozepur,
accusing Kheta Singh, the 68-year-old
father of Jaskaran Singh and brother, of
helping a woman get old-age pension of
Rs 200 a month though her husband
allegedly owned eight acres land.
Vigilance department arrested both and
detained them illegally for 10 days. 43 The
only punishment given by the Punjab
government against such harassment and
illegal detention was transfer of Ferozepur
Vigilance Superintendent of Police,
Inderjit Singh Randhawa. This is despite
that even Chief Minister Amarinder Singh
himself regretted the arrest of Kheta
Singh. 44
A hotel owner, Mukesh Nayyar of
204
Ludhiana was allegedly picked up from
his hotel by the Kotwali police at 12 noon
on 4 December 2004, and detained
illegally for more than 13 hours for his
alleged reluctance to repay borrowed
money. Following intervention by his
family, he was released after midnight. He
was allegedly humiliated and tortured by
the police. After coming back from the
police station he reportedly developed
chest pain and had to be hospitalized in the
Intensive Cardiac Care Unit of a hospital 45
iv. Prison conditions
The prison conditions remained
deplorable and the rights of the prisoners
continued to be violated.
Relatives of ailing inmates needed to
bribe the medical staff of the jails to get
their kin referred to civil hospital for
proper medical treatment. On January
2004, the Vigilance Bureau had caught a
policeman Dheeraj Kumar while accepting
bribe of Rs 3000 from a relative of an
undertrial on behalf of Dr David of the
Jallandhar Central Jail. The Vigilance
Bureau seized official records of the jail
hospital and conducted raids to nab the
absconding medical officer. Undertrials
were allegedly referred to the local Civil
Hospital for better treatment only if the
officials were bribed. 46
Deputy Superintendent of the
Amritsar Central Jail Sardool Singh,
police head constables- Sukhwinder
Singh, Mahinder Singh, Gurdeep Singh
and constables- Chanchal Singh, Harjinder
Singh and Sham Singh were reportedly