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

INDIA HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT 2005 Tripura
Maheshwar was a school-dropout and
learning driving. On 14 March 2004, the
victims were kidnapped from their village
by the NLFT with an intention to recruit
them. On 16 March 2004, they were
brought to Chichingcherra village. The
police happened to raid the NLFT camp on
that day. During the encounter, the NLFT
members allegedly used the victims as
shields, pushed them forward and they
themselves fled from the spot. Though the
youth allegedly raised their hands in
surrender, the police and TSR jawans
sprayed them with bullets. After killing
both of them the police claimed that they
were hardcore NLFT cadres. 14
On 29 March 2004, Laxmipati
Malsum filed a complaint with the
Teliamura police station accusing that her
husband, Chandra Bahadur, a daily
laborer, was extrajudicially executed by a
combined force of state police and TSR
jawans on 22 March 2004. She said the
combined force conducted special search
operations at Chintakumar Roajapara
village under Teliamura police station, but
finding no member of the armed
opposition groups, they picked up her
innocent husband and later shot him dead.
The security forces, however, claimed that
an NLFT cadre had been killed in an
encounter. 15
In March 2004, Chief minister Manik
Sarkar reportedly ordered a magisterial
inquiry into killing of Ramesh Debbarma
who was shot dead by the TSR jawans of
Radhapur outpost led by Naik Subedar
Dharma Sadhan Jamatia on the
232
intervening night of 31 December 2003
and 1 January 2004. Ramesh Debbarma
was a class X student of Jirania High
School when he was going to his
grandfather’s house at Banskobra to attend
a ceremony on 31 December 2003. The
police claimed that the student was killed
during an encounter with the armed
groups. 16
In early May 2004, at least 22 tribal
persons including women and children
were reportedly injured when the Assam
Rifles jawans led by Nayek M S Garowal
of Ratanpur post under Khowai police
station went berserk during a counterinsurgency
operation in Mandaibari
village of West Tripura district. A tribal
shopkeeper Sanjit Debbarma of
Mandaibari was brutally tortured, his shop
was ransacked and a cash of Rs. 2638 and
other valuables were allegedly looted by
the jawans when he pleaded ignorance
about the movement of armed opposition
groups in the area. He had to be admitted
in Khowai Hospital. The villagers lodged a
FIR at Khowai police station. According to
them, the security forces were drunk when
they rampaged the village and tortured
them. 17
ii. Impunity
There is impunity for the security
forces. The state government had initiated
a Magisterial probe into the death of a
tribal youth named Biswas Singh Malsom
on 20 December 2003 at Watak Malsom
para under Birganj police station in an
alleged encounter with TSR in South