I want to deal with the judicial system of India as I go on talking about my son. The sane old dictum of the Indian judiciary is that even if thousands of culprits escape, not even a single innocent person should be punished. The fathers of our judicial system were that particular that no innocent person should be punished wrongly. But today our enquiry officers never care a damn whether the real culprits or the innocent are the ones punished.
What is it that we call punishment? Is it imprisonment? Is it being tortured in police camps like Kakkayam? Although nobody has thought aloud about this, it has disturbed me for some time now. Lock-up torture cannot be compared to imprisonment, whether simple or rigorous. We are by now used to news of deaths due to lock-up torture, and continue to hear of such deaths, yet they are not called ‘punishment’. Meanwhile, the real culprits often escape punishment. When things are looked at from this angle, it is not difficult to conclude that the sublime dictum of the Indian judiciary, not to punish the innocent, is being violated blatantly.
So it was in Rajan’s case. There was never even an attempt to find out if he was a real culprit or not. They just took him, tortured him and killed him. That was all that happened. Somebody gave the police a list and they picked up people from that list. Whether somebody was a culprit or not was irrelevant to those police. None among these police officers were anxious about the future of a young man in their custody.
Although trained to use scientific methods in finding real culprits, none of the police employed them. They found it easier to torture the accused. With such an easy way, why resort to scientific methods? This is why I believe that the police are only instruments of torture for the state.
When after four days the principal of the Engineering College, Professor Vahabudeen, had no information about the arrested students, he went to the camp at Kakkayam together with a Professor George. Going to the police camp run by Mr. Jayaram Padikkal in those days was like going to a lion’s den. But they decided to go because they loved their students. I don’t know what words of praise can express my gratitude to these saintly souls. When Mr. Padikkal was informed of their arrival, he arrogantly instructed that, ‘I will meet the principal, but not the other professor.’ Rajan was dear to the teachers and other students at the Engineering College, and was a favorite student of Professor Vahabudeen. He took keen interest in his case throughout, and still continues to do so.
Throughout his college days, Rajan was staying with Professor Mohan Kumar and family. He was a professor of mechanical engineering and the brother-in-law of Rajan’s uncle. During my wanderings in search of Rajan, I had stayed in his house for two or three days. One afternoon, Crime Branch Circle Inspector Mr. Sreedharan, along with two other policemen, came there asking for me. They behaved very nicely, expressing sorrow over the disappearance of my son. They gave me a lot of advice too, among which I found one thing particularly interesting. They advised me to read a book by the extremist leader Mr. K. Venu. Actually, I had already read the book, but as I was not interested in discussing it with a police officer I pretended ignorance. Only later did I come to know that everybody in the house, except me of course, were ice cold, scared of the police presence. The first thing I did the next morning was to pack up and move over to a lodge.
Another incident involving a friend of mine, Professor Viswambharan, head of the Department of Hindi in the Government Arts and Science College, exposed another side of the police culture. He was staying with his wife near the college. I also stayed with this couple for a few days. The next week Circle Inspector Sreedharan met them one night and shouted, ‘Where is your friend, that professor?’ He threatened them in typical police style. The police were trying to prove that I too was an extremist. Unfamiliar with such situations, Professor Viswambharan and his wife panicked. They didn’t sleep that night, thinking that a great calamity awaited me. When I came to know of this I tried to console them. The police behaviour was unpredictable.
I tried to contact Circle Inspector Sreedharan, but failed. I realised later that Mr. Sreedharan came to meet me knowing that Rajan was dead. I shudder to think what sadistic pleasure these people had by treating a feeble old man in that way.
