Complainants in Petty Theft Cases Bear the Brunt of Police Interrogation

By Mohammad Asif Siddiqui

Khandwa, Madhya Pradesh: The day he was robbed, Sheikh Rafiq (48) of Badhiyatula in Khandwa district could not sleep. The next nine nights were no different as he was distressed by the way the police kept harassing him. They behaved as if he were the accused and not the complainant, his family said. By the tenth day, he died by suicide. 

“Within those 10 days, the police contacted almost every relative of ours in the district, got their details, including about their work, obtained their bank account details and got information from them about my father. The day before my father committed suicide, the town inspector contacted him and asked him to bring my mother to the police station,” said Rafiq’s son, Sheikh Wasim.

“Considering the police’s insulting behaviour, my father did not wish to take my mother there, but he also knew the consequences of avoiding the police. Upset over this, he left home at midnight, but we were cautious enough not to let him fall off our radar. We brought him back home, but he left the house again around 4 am, when everyone was fast asleep, and jumped in front of a train,” Wasim detailed.

Wasim accused the town inspector of harassing Rafiq when he was called to give his statement. The money totalling Rs 81,000 was snatched away when Rafiq was returning home after selling the produce in the market. “My father was carrying his own money, and he did not even have to give an account of it to anyone. How could he lodge a false complaint?” Wasim said, his younger brother, Sheikh Hashim, narrated the same story.

“I was with him when the town inspector contacted him. His wife was being called to the police station. No woman from this family had ever gone to the police station. He was very worried about this; he knew that the police would treat his wife in the same way as they treated him,” Naeem Khan, the brother-in-law of Rafiq, told 101Reporters.

The police registered a First Information Report (FIR), but continued to harass the complainant as they considered this case to be fake. However, Khandwa District Superintendent of Police Manoj Rai differed on this. “If the police will not interrogate, how will the investigation progress? Police investigate all the points in every case. Whatever cases come to the police, they take them seriously. Only then does the public's trust in us get strengthened,” he told 101Reporters.

See Also: When Police Used a Child Victim to Nab his Father in a Murder Case

Police attitudes 

However, a study on non-registration of crimes by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in 2017 indicates that unruly behaviour by the police deters about three-fourths of the Indian population from reporting complaints. 

And, of course, not all complaints result in FIRs. The same study posited that less than 10 per cent of crimes in society are actually getting registered. It also quotes a 2017 Crime Victimisation Survey conducted in major Indian cities to indicate that only about seven per cent of victims of theft lodged an FIR.

“The reason police stations hesitate to register theft cases is that in most such cases, the thieves are not caught, and these cases remain pending. Because of this, the officers posted there stay under constant scrutiny from higher authorities, especially during crime meetings when police functioning gets reviewed,” said Pradeep Singh Ranawat, Retired City Police Superintendent from Jaora. “It becomes necessary to justify how much property was stolen and how much of it has been recovered. To avoid these situations, police personnel often neglect or hesitate to register theft cases.”

“Once an FIR is registered through any means, the police cannot cancel it. Such cases must be presented in court. Therefore, the primary aim of police officials is that pending cases should not appear, and the number of registered cases should appear lower compared to the previous year,” he said. 

In the State of Policing India report 2019, focusing on Police Adequacy and Working Conditions, a survey of nearly 12,000 police personnel across the country found that 54 per cent believe that an increase in the number of FIRs registered indicates an increase in crime in the area, as opposed to an increase in registration of complaints by the police. 

In the chapter ‘People-friendly Police or Police-fearing People?’,  the report notes that the common complaint in India is that police refuse to lodge FIRs, likely due to the mistaken notion that high crime rates reflect poorly on police performance. On top of this, 37 per cent of personnel feel that for minor offences, a small punishment should be handed out by the police rather than a legal trial.

See Also: Guilty by Marriage: How a Family is Punished Under UAPA

Scams, goats and other missing FIRs

Unsurprisingly, we see these attitudes playing out over and over among victims and their interactions with the police when it comes to petty crimes. Living in Bhatalpura village on the border of Khandwa and Khargone districts, Nanibai Bhalrai (66) works as a labourer in the fields of both districts. She takes up agricultural work for six months and grazes goats the rest of the year.

Three months ago, when she woke up in the morning, five of her goats, worth Rs 80,000, tied in the courtyard of her house were missing. Due to jurisdictional issues, Bhalrai kept running between Deshgaon and Bhikangaon police stations. Yet, her complaint could not be lodged. Bhalrai desperately searched for the goats in the meantime and, after 15 days, managed to find them grazing in a field near Devjhiri, 10 km from Bhatalpura. Though she tried hard to find out who was grazing them, she did not succeed. But Bhalrai is happy that at least her goats are back. 

In another case, Khandwa-based readymade garment businessman Anup Kumar Gurbani (68) was duped during his morning walk on May 19, but the police found it convenient to put him under the scanner.

On May 19, Gurbani found himself the victim of an elaborate scam, which claimed his gold ring, and he reached the nearby Padam Nagar Police Station to lodge a complaint. However, the police did not accept his complaint and asked him to come the next day. The next day, when he reached the police station again, the assistant sub-inspector started interrogating him. His complaint of fraud could not be lodged that day as well. After the incident, Gurbani stopped going for morning walks alone. Tired of the police's questions, Gurbani also gave up the hope of getting back his gold ring.

For those bypassing humans, the process isn’t smooth either. When Amin Ahmed Shaikh (43) of Khandwa registered an online FIR for a theft that happened on February 27, the police put pressure on him to withdraw the case. Shaikh told 101Reporters that he owned a farm at Badgaon Bhila in Nagchoon panchayat. To secure the place, he brought fencing material to the farm. However, a lot of goods were stolen from there. Upon investigation, it was found that 10 fibre chairs and 60 iron angles of 5 ft length, worth approximately Rs 15,000 to 18,000, had been stolen.

When he filed an online FIR, the police were not keen on recording it in the manual register. Instead, the town inspector put pressure on him to withdraw the complaint. He withdrew the complaint, but the thieves are still at large. 

The problem of ‘missing FIRs’ is well-acknowledged. A parliamentary panel in 2017 questioned the basis of government claims that around 78% (approximately 12,000) of police stations in the country are registering 100% FIRs. At that time, the committee strongly recommended that the government consider making refusal of registration of FIR by police personnel a criminal offence and that action be taken against such erring police personnel.

Ranawat remembers that there were provisions under the IPC to record thefts of less than Rs 1000. They were registered with a clear mention that the FIR was merely for record and that no detailed investigation would be carried out. The new laws are clearer, stressing on community service and swift disposal of such cases. 

Notably, Section 283(1) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita grants Chief Judicial Magistrates and first-class Magistrates the power to conduct summary trials for certain offenses, such as petty theft where the value of the property does not exceed Rs 20,000. And Section 303 (2) of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita states that if the stolen property is worth less than Rs 5,000 and it is a first time conviction for the person, he/she may be punished with community service if the said property or its value is returned. 

This story was produced for and originally published as part of the Crime and Punishment project in collaboration with Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy.

This article was originally published in 101 Reporters under Creative Common license. Read the original article.

[DS]

Suggested Reading: