A female police officer who was seen beating a tribal youth in a widely circulated video eight months ago should not receive a post in the field for the next two years, the Odisha Human Rights Commission has said.
The Odisha police had given Inspector Sandhyarani Jena a clean note.
However, the chairman of the commission, Judge Bimal Das, and member Asim Amitav Das, rejected the police officer’s claims of innocence and, after watching the video, observed that the inspector had clearly used force on the young man. tribal, which amounted to custodial violence.
On March 25, Chiita Ranjan Mahanta, from Talasarua village, Keonjhar district, had gone to the Patna Police Station in connection with an FIR in connection with a land dispute in which he was named a defendant. At the police station, Inspector Jena hit and kicked her. It was suspended after video of the incident emerged in May and sparked outrage across the country.
This is the second case in two days in which the commission has harshly criticized police officers facing charges for violating the human rights of citizens. On Thursday, the commission ordered a police inspector to pay 5 lakh rupees as a fine for arresting two men on a fabricated murder charge. The two men spent eight months in jail before being released.
The commission had ordered Inspector Sandhyarani Jena to pay an interim compensation of Rs 10,000 to the tribal man who was accused of hitting and kicking. But she went to the higher court against this direction, arguing that the commission had not heard her before ordering compensation. The higher court agreed with her and told the commission to hear her version first.
The inspector denied the assault and said the video was made in what she described as melodramatic. He also cited the clean note given to him by his superior officer, the area subdivision police officer who had conducted an investigation. The report said it was unintentional and without malice.
The commission disagreed, calling its action an affront to the state government’s positive initiative to make the force more transparent and people-friendly.
“The state police are a disciplined force and for any act of commission and omission, the department should not be defamed. The inspector must be sent to receive training on how to treat the accused and in typical situations, ”the commission ruled.
The human rights commission also noted that CCTV was not operating at the police station when the incident occurred. “This leads to the presumption that the inspector took the opportunity to hit and kick an accused inside the police station. It is the inspector’s responsibility to keep it functional, ”the order said.
.
