GUWAHATI: Suspended Assam IPS officer Dr N Rajamarthandan, accused of arbitrarily providing information to a member of Nikhil Bharat Banglali Udbastu Samanway Samitee (NBBUSS) by flouting RTI Act and keeping his seniors in the dark, was arrested on Friday.
Earlier, a case against the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) senior superintendent of police was registered under Sections 120(B)/418/468/471 of IPC and Section 98(A) of Assam Police Act, 2007. Following his arrest, he was produced in a Guwahati court which sent him to two days police custody.
The director general of police Mukesh Sahay said Rajamarthandan was arrested as prima facie there was some strong evidence of wrongdoing against him.
“When the case was registered against the IPS officer, the police prima facie must have found something against him. However, it will be wrong for me to elaborate (his offence) since the process of investigation is still on,” Sahay added.
Rajamarthandan, who was heading the probe by special investigation team into March 6 ransacking of Silapathar office of All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), had passed on information to NBBUSS general secretary Ambika Roy in response to the latter’s RTI application seeking information about the arrest of NBBUSS president Subodh Biswas, the alleged mastermind of the attack.
An IPS officer of 2006 batch, Rajamarthandan had furnished documents, including classified, to Roy without informing his bosses or taking permission from them. He was also allegedly in touch with some leaders of NBBUSS. Not only did he meet them, he also met the legal counsels of Biswas secretly.
Sources said during his interrogation, the IPS officer had defended his action saying that he did no wrong by providing information about the case under the RTI Act. He argued that information that he had furnished was permissible under the Act.
On March 6, NBBUSS chief Biswas had allegedly instigated a mob at a rally with his speech that led to the incident. He went into hiding after the incident until being arrested on March 22 from a place close to Bangladesh border in West Bengal’s North 24 Parganas. He is currently in judicial custody and the protesting organisations are demanding exemplary punishment for him.
The incident had sparked off widespread protests with the several organisations viewing it as an attack on the Assamese by the illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.
The mob had damaged “sahid bedi”, erected in memory of 855 martyrs of Assam agitation of early 1980s, and photographs of Assam’s pride, legendary singer-composer Bhupen Hazarika and doyen of Assamese film and litterateur Jyotiprasad Agarwalla among others.