Intelligence agencies make a mess of investigations
NEW DELHI: In the name of combating terror, the country’s security forces are resorting to appalling tactics and framing innocents, reveal detailed DNA investigations into some recent high profile cases. And with no systems in place to ensure accountability, such blatant wrong-doing is continuing unchecked.
The DNA investigation was prompted by a recent Central Bureau of Investigation finding that the Delhi Police had framed two of its own informers as terrorists. Sources in the security and intelligence agencies and in the legal fraternity have raised disturbing questions about the claims of many state police forces about encounters, terrorists and recovery of explosives in recent times.
DNA accessed detailed court documents, secret intelligence communications and interviewed several senior police officials. The findings are startling: security agencies fighting terror are exceeding their brief and producing innocent people before the courts as terrorists and spies of foreign countries especially Pakistan.
In this the first of a series of articles on what is going wrong with India’s war on terror, we deal with three cases of questionable claims. The most recent incident was the February 4, 2007 ‘shootout’ a stone’s throw away from Connaught Place in the heart of the national capital. Police claimed to have foiled serial blasts in the capital with the arrest of four ‘terrorists’ after the ‘shootout’. But forensic investigations have raised questions.
Another instance was the January 2004 arrest of an Omani national in Jaipur on the charge of spying for Pakistan. A local court recently acquitted him of charges under the Official Secrets Act while convicting him for staying without a visa.
The third case is of a Manipuri whom the Jammu and Kashmir Police claim is a Lashkar-e-Taiba activist from Bangladesh.
Sources in the security forces are saying these instances will result in producing genuine terrorists. “Every victim of police brutality is a potential terrorist of the future,” warns a senior IPS officer.
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