Cops thrash anti-graft student, file FIR

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A 16-year-old school boy was brutally beaten up with lathis by a traffic police team on the IT highway Thursday night after the teenager tried to record on his mobile phone cops taking bribe, his mother has alleged.

Worse still, the police have slapped a FIR against the boy accusing him of obstructing them from discharging their duty. Brought in by his father late Thursday night, doctors at the casualty ward of government Royapettah hospital treated the boy for “multiple contusions” on arms, legs and back, the hospital revealed.

Mrs Jain, wife of a city financier, in her complaint to the city police commissioner Friday morning said her son Roshan (name changed to protect minor’s identity) studying in eleventh class in a city school was returning home to Thuraipakkam in the family car along with his 11-year-old sister and an office assistant, when a traffic police team stopped the car.

The police questioned the driver Rafi Qul about the fancy number plate and over-speeding and slapped a fine of Rs 1,050. The cops then demanded 'whatever is available' as bribe and Roshan paid Rs 250.

According to her petition to the commissioner, when the boy “tried to catch the happenings” on his mobile phone camera, he was brutally attacked by the policemen. “They pushed him down on the road and beat him up”, she said. The boy, along with those in the car, was taken to the Kannagi Nagar police station. Again the boy was beaten up, so too the driver and the office assistant.

Roshan’s father, Mr Jain, told DC that he had gone in search of his children and found them in Kannagi Nagar police station. “My son was in great pain. An assistant commissioner by name Ravi arrived and he too chastised the sub-inspector for beating up the kid.

The AC asked us to go to Thoraipakkam police station but I chose to rush the boy to the hospital because he was badly injured”, Mr Jain said.

But AC Ravi had another story. “I was not present at the station. We filed an FIR against the boy for prevented the policemen from discharging their duty”, he said, when asked about the family’s version.

Cops’ FIR hurts more than lathis

Doctors at the casualty ward of government Royapettah hospital, where Mr Jain took his 16-year-old son Roshan (name changed) for treatment, have diagnosed 'multiple contusions' on his wrists, arms and back. After treating him for the painful injuries, they discharged the boy advising rest for ten days, records at the hospital showed.

“That boy was in great pain. The injuries appeared to have been caused by wooden logs, He said policemen hit him. We took x-rays of both the wrists and hands. luckily there were no fractures”, a duty doctor told DC.

Mr Jain, the father, recalled his son telling him that the traffic policemen started raining blows with lathis the moment he took out his mobile phone. “May be my son was influenced by Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption campaign. He told the cops, Anna, you are doing wrong by taking bribe. I am going to shoot this on my mobile. They pounced him at once”, Mr Jain said.

He said the police grabbed the phone and began hitting the boy brutally. “They returned the phone but have kept our car at the police station”, he said.

His lawyer Sudha Ramalingam, well-known human rights campaigner, is preparing to move the HC for quashing the FIR and direction to register a case against the ‘erring’ cops. “Police have registered FIR belatedly after coming to know that the boy was taken to a government hospital and they would be exposed. Both the national and state human rights commissions should take up this issue”, she told DC.

“Our CoP J.K. Tripathy is citizen-friendly, so I am sure he will take up this issue seriously”, the lawyer said.