The Gauhati High Court on Monday dismissed a petition seeking an investigation into the alleged custodial deaths of three men from the Hmar community in Assam’s Cachar district.

Lallungawi Hmar, Lalbeikkung Hmar and Joshua were killed in an alleged gunfight with the police on July 17, 2024, a day after they were arrested on the suspicion of being militants.

The killings had triggered outrage in Assam and neighbouring Manipur.

Hmar groups had sought an investigation into the incident.

The families of the men had in August 2024 filed a petition in the High Court seeking an independent investigation into the alleged custodial deaths.

They had sought an independent director general of police from outside Assam or a senior police officer, independent of the Assam Police and the state government, to be appointed as the investigating officer.

In its order on Monday, a bench of Justices Kalyan Rai Surana and Susmita Phukan Khaund said that the investigation into the incident had been referred to the National Human Rights Commission and an additional superintendent of police in Hailakandi district.

“At this juncture, this court is of the opinion that it cannot be pre-empted that the investigating agency will conduct the investigation in a partisan manner and screen the police officials involved in extrajudicial killings,” the court added.

The bench also said that the petitioners were at liberty to file an appropriate application if they were still “aggrieved on the culmination of the investigation”.

“It is not clear at this juncture, if charge sheet has been laid against erring officials, or if investigation is still under progress,” the court observed.

The bench added that it will not comment on the digital evidence as the investigation was “presumably still under progress”.

In March, the National Human Rights Commission had disposed of the matter based on a magisterial inquiry conducted by an Assam Civil Service officer. This was contrary to the rights panel’s guidelines, which mandate a judicial inquiry into suspected custodial deaths.

A lawyer observing the case, who did not want to be identified, told Scroll that the family of the three men had moved the court because they did not trust the Assam government to conduct a fair investigation into the alleged custodial killings.

The court “accepts that the post-mortem does reveal torture, and shots fired from point-blank range, thus, establishing the possibility of cold-blooded murder by the police”, the lawyer said.

“But it finds it unfathomable as to why the state would kill random people and asks the family of the deceased to trust the investigation, and wait for the NHRC to complete the inquiry,” the lawyer added.

The lawyer said that the order displayed the “unconstrained trust” that the judiciary had in the executive to investigate itself.

“However, there is nothing on record to suggest that government has done anything to hold that trust,” the lawyer told Scroll. “On the contrary, the government’s story is entirely different, which makes them an interested party to the act.”

The lawyer added that the case had been filed in July 2024 and that the court had reserved its judgement for three months.

“[The court] could have at least called for the progress of the investigation,” the lawyer said.

The National Human Rights Commission closing the matter based on a magisterial inquiry conducted by an executive officer violated a Supreme Court direction and the panel’s own rules that allegations on custodial deaths should be looked into by a judicial officer, the lawyer said.

The case

During the proceedings in the court, the petitioners told the bench that the three men had been arrested from the Ganga Nagar area in Cachar’s Krishnapur Road.

“At least six police personnel present, tied their hands behind their backs and took them to the police station and detained them,” the court order on Monday quoted the petitioners as having claimed.

They added that the men were intercepted from an auto rickshaw. “It is alleged that the three arrested men were taken out of the police station sometime in the night or early in the morning of [July 17, 2024] and killed by the Assam Police in cold blood,” the petitioners had alleged.

Hours after the deaths, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had said on social media that the three men were suspected militants who were killed in a gunfight with the Cachar Police. He added that the police recovered three rifles and a pistol from them.

The police had later claimed that they had first arrested the three men before taking them to the Bhuban Hills area, where another group of suspected militants were reportedly hiding with a huge cache of arms.

According to the police’s statement, as their personnel and the three suspected militants reached the hills, the second group of suspected militants opened fire at them.

“The apprehended militants wearing bulletproof jackets and helmets sustained on their persons,” read the statements.

They were taken to a hospital, where the police said they were soon declared dead.

However, the Hmar Students’ Association and the Hmar Inpui, the apex body of the Hmar tribe in the North East, alleged that the three men were “arbitrarily detained, taken to an undisclosed location and then brutally shot dead under circumstances that defy all principles of justice and human rights”.

The Hmar Students’ Association had said that the persons who died were not militants but “village volunteers who valiantly defended the Kuki-Zomi-Hmar villages against Meitei militants”.

The term “village volunteers” has been used for armed civilians guarding villages since the ethnic clashes broke out between the Kuki-Zo-Hmars and Meiteis communities in neighbouring Manipur in May 2023.

“The Assam Police’s claim of an encounter is riddled with inconsistencies and contradicted by compelling video evidence, which exposes the fabricated nature of their account,” the student body had alleged.

📰 Crime Today News is proudly sponsored by DRYFRUIT & CO – A Brand by eFabby Global LLC

Design & Developed by Yes Mom Hosting