UPDATE (India): Cases registered against Guria must be expedited

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received updated information regarding the case of human rights activists associated with Guria, that the case is dragging on in the court in spite of all the attempts to expedite the proceedings. Guria is a human rights organisation based in Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh state of India.

UPDATE INFORMATION:

Mr. Ajeet Singh and Ms. Manju are human rights activists associated with Guria. Guria works on issues related to forced prostitution and human trafficking in Varanasi. On 25 October 2005, Ajeet and Manju along with several other volunteers rescued 31 persons including women and children from brothels in Vranasi. The persons recued were being brought to the brothels in Varanasi for forced prostitution. After the rescue, they were handed over to the local police.

After the rescue, several cases were registered against the brothel keepers by the Manduadih police. The AHRC in the past had issued urgent appeals regarding this case which are available at UA-190-2005, UP-131-2005 and UP-035-2006. Under the influence of the brothel keepers and their mafia, the local police had also registered cases against the activists. The registering of cases against the human rights activists were with an intention to pressure the activists to withdraw their statements in court so as to facilitate an acquittal to the criminals involved in the forced prostitution case. All these cases are now contested in local courts.

The brothel keepers have been adopting delaying tactics to protract the proceedings in all the cases. In the past, several attempts were made by the prime accused in the case to obtain stay of proceedings of the lower court from the High Court. Each time when the cases against the brothel keepers were taken up a stay order was issued by the High Court, only to be vacated subsequently when the stay order was challenged by the lawyer appointed by Guria. It is suspected that the prosecutor at the High Court, was bribed by the brothel keepers so that he would not oppose the stay application at the first instance when it is moved at the High Court.

In the meanwhile one of the prime accused in the case Mr. Rahmat, was murdered by the police. The police claimed that he was shot dead while attempting to escape from custody. Guria however alleges that Rahmat was killed since some senior police officers were afraid that if Rahmat was to be produced in court, he would divulge the involvement of some police officers in human trafficking in Varanasi. The remaining accused were released on bail soon after by the lower court.

When the bail application was filed for the accused, Guria opposed the application on the ground that if the accused were released on bail they would never appear again in the court and would threaten and intimidate the witnesses in the case. Guria also raised the objection that most of the bail bonds produced in court is fabricated and that the court cannot depend upon the documents as an adequate guarantee for the accused. However the court did not agree to Guria’s position and released the accused on bail. Soon after that Guria could back-trace these documents and prove in court that the documents produced in court were in fact fabricated. The court cancelled the bail bonds. But by then the accused had disappeared.

In addition to the cases filed against the criminals there are also cases charge sheeted against the activists associated with Guria by the local police. These cases are also being dragged on in the court, without being taken up for trail. For various reasons, including the failure on the part of the prosecution, these cases are being adjourned. In the meanwhile the Mr. Ajeet and Ms. Manju were threatened by the criminals asking them to withdraw from the prosecution case. They have not done so far and are determined to fight the case to its end.

The entire incident that has resulted in a series of cases and counter cases started in October 2005. The charges were filed in court soon after the incident. However, in some cases the investigation is still not over whereas in others the case is being dragged on after partial examination of the witnesses. These cases are classic examples of the state of affairs in the criminal justice delivery system in India.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

The criminal justice machinery in India performs far below than what it is expected to do. The key factors that run the criminal justice system in India are the police or other law enforcement agency that investigates a crime, the prosecution led by the prosecutors’ office and the courts. All the three elements suffer from under performance, corruption and lack of accountability in India. This leads to gross miscarriage of justice in courts.

Take for example the case of Guria. All that Guria and the activists associated with Guria tried to do was to expose forced prostitution in Varanasi. In the process they complained to the local police to take action against those who were bringing women and children to Varanasi for their ‘business’. The local police and even the higher ranks of the police not only failed to take any action, but also informed that complaints were being made to the brothel keepers. When forced to take some action, the local police after informing the brothel keepers visited the place and as expected found nothing. This exercise continued several times making the entire attempt by Guria to rescue women and children from being forced to prostitution a mockery.

It was at this time that Guria got information that a new batch of women and girls were being brought to the brothels in October 2005. They waited for the day and finally when the victims were brought to the brothels, Guria and their volunteers surrounded the place, blocked the roads to the red-light area and called the police for help. The police refused to arrive. Given no other alternative Guria started rescuing the victim women and girls on their own. It is suspected that the police arrived at the scene only to rescue the brothel keepers, but not the women and children who were forced to prostitution.

Once at the scene, due to the presence of the media the police were forced to take action against the brothel keepers. Yet the first attempt of the police was to hand over the rescued women and children back to the pimps. This was prevented by Guria by pressing the police to produce the rescued women and children before the local Magistrate Court. When they were finally produced before the court, yet again, the police tried to oblige to the demands of the brothel keepers by allowing custody of the women and children to strangers. In fact these men were organised by the brothel keepers to claim back their ‘commodity’. This was also to a certain extend prevented by Guria.

Then the police registered false cases against Guria and their activists alleging that they had broken into private premises and had caused pecuniary damages to the residents. Several other charges were also leveled against Guria by the police under the instructions of the brothel keepers. The human rights activists associated with Guria were charged with offenses like molesting women and causing breach of peace. None of these charges have any factual basis, yet, once a charge is filed in court the accused, whoever it may be, either has to be discharged by the court or acquitted.

Fabrication of charges is a regular tactic used by the police and other law enforcement agencies to bargain between the accused and a complainant in the process of prosecution. In fact registration of a crime is considered as a bargaining possibility by the law enforcement agencies rather than a duty or a crime control activity.

As of now there are six cases registered against the brothel keepers. They are all pending before various courts in Varanasi. The case numbers are 274/2005, 294/2005, 295/2005, 280/2005, 300/2005 and 121/2007. The police to please the brothel keepers have registered four cases against the human rights activists associated with Guria. The case numbers are 274/c/2005, 274/e/2005, 274/g/2005 and 274/h/2005. All these cases as of now are being dragged on in the court.

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please write to the persons listed below expressing your concern about the progress in this case. The AHRC is also writing to the UN Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons and the Special Rapporteur on the Sale of Children calling for an immediate intervention in this case.

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