Dead bodies don’t lie
November 27, 11.30 p.m.
Kerala Police develops technology to fire bullets at people without damaging their clothes. Maoist Ajitha’s body was riddled with 19 bullet holes and Kuppuswamy’s with 5 bullet holes. Miraculously, their ‘maoist uniforms’ look so clean and tidy, and free of holes. There are only a few loopholes, which you can always close with the right connections.
November 26, 12.06 a.m.
The bodies don’t lie. Only the police do. The Kerala Police seems to have succesfully executed a fake encounter going by the nature of injuries on the bodies of the two dead people, the lack of enough weaponry on the spot and the lack of injuries to the thunderbolt commandos to justify the encounter story. Those who are in the habit of blindly believing the police version might accept it.
We also have no information till now about any crime that they have committed, even though that also doesn’t justify the summary executions by the commandos. The only things that we have heard about the Kerala maoists are random appearances at some village, asking for rice and other materials from people there and pasting of posters at some places. There are a few acts of vandalism like breaking the glass windows of some private firm that have been alleged on them. The only other “crime” that has been documented is the writing of really bad literature like ‘Vasanthathile poomarangal’.
So, there was nothing in the past, or during the alleged encounter, which warranted the kind of disproportionate use of force by the thunderbolt commandos. The involvement of the blood thirsty forces from Andhra also strengthens the possibility of this being a fake encounter, for they are past masters at it. It’s pretty irresponsible on the part of the Chief Minister/Home Minister to claim that he still does not have much information on this, a full 24 hours after the encounter. Such encounter killings are a disgrace for Kerala and its left Government. This is not a police state and these commandos have to be held accountable for daylight murder. We don’t have to wait for the revelations by a retired policeman, in the evening of his life (as has happened in the case of the encounter which killed naxalite Varghese in 1970 The truth was revealed by the policeman who fired the shot, 40 years later ), to know that this is a fake encounter.
Being a maoist is no crime, until and unless the maoist commits a crime. And to judge that, there is the judiciary. The arrogant, lawless men in uniform have to be put in their place. I meant the police, not the maoists.
The state police chief Loknath Behera cannot be allowed to become another SP Kalluri. The responsibility for that lies squarely with the CM/HM.
November 24, 11.30 p.m.
“Being a Maoist is no crime. Freedom of thought and liberty of conscience is a natural right. Freedom becomes unlawful only when it concerns the physical law of the State.A person cannot be arrested merely based on his/her’s affiliation to the organisation.” — This is what the Kerala High Court had said last year, after the Wayanad police picked up Shyam Balakrishnan from his house, wrongly accusing him of being a maoist. The court had also ordered the Kerala Police to pay him compensation for the illegal arrest.
The thunderbolt commandos who gunned down three ‘alleged’ maoists inside the Nilambur forests today might not have heard about this. But atleast the media is expected to know this, when they unquestioningly repeat the police version on screen. As usual, the encounter stories in television mention that they are dreaded maoists, but do not specifically mention the crimes they have committed. That is, if there are any.
None of the commandos are known to be injured. So, the natural question of whether they could have been captured alive also arises. This question also is sadly missing from most of the reports. The police officers have also been tight-lipped, telling the media that more details can be revealed only tomorrow.
After the fake encounter in Bhopal and another one of maoists in chattisgarh, which we all have forgotten thanks to the supreme leader’s demonetisation diversion, this is the third encounter killing in the past few months in the country, which raises the question whether we have found an easy solution to the pendency of cases in our courts and the shortage of judges. This time though, the left Government in Kerala has much to answer for, especially so, since the Chief Minister himself occupies the Home Minister’s chair.
The ugliest sight today was the State Police Chief’s gleeful words on the “motivation” of his boys.
