HYDERABAD: An investigation team of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has found that the police arrested and physically tortured some residents of Lagcherla at the Parigi police station for attacking the Vikarabad district collector and revenue officials during a public hearing on acquisition of land for a proposed Pharma City in November, 2024.
The Commission declared that violation of human rights of the villagers was found to be true. It further stated that the police acted with political vendetta targeting opposition BRS and BJP workers. Neither was any Congress supporter booked nor were any arrests made, it added in its report.
It may be recalled that following complaints from the residents of Lagcherla of harassment, physical abuse and filing of false criminal charges against them by police in the wake of the attack on the collector, the NHRC sent a joint team of its law and investigation officers for an inquiry.
The report said: “On the basis of available statements, documents and reports, highhandedness was detected on the part of police and local authorities.” It stated that “the villagers who were arrested at night were beaten up at the Parigi PS and were threatened not to speak about the torture in front of the magistrate. Though the arrested villagers were detained in the police station, this was not mentioned in the General Diary”.
“The order of land acquisition was indeed issued by government agencies as per law but during the land acquisition, the way of handling adopted by police officials was not as per law. The CCTV cameras of lockup and Circle Inspector(CI) office were found not to be functional, where the villagers were detained in the night after their arrest. The GD entries were also not updated, which indicates reckless attitude of police personnel,” it added.
Political vendetta
The probe also revealed that several individuals who were neither present at the protest site nor affected by the project had been arrested by the police.
“It is to be noted that angle of political vendetta also emerged during enquiry. Villagers, who were supporters of a non-ruling political party, were arrested by the police. Some people who had nothing to do with this incident were also arrested because they were supporters of the other political party. Cases were registered against minors, students, government officials, some of them were not even present in the village during the incident of clash between district authorities and villagers on November 11, 2024,” the report noted.