Andhra Pradesh Minority Commission appointed Ravi Chander as Advocate Commissioner to (probe into and) submit a factual report on the illegal detention and torture of Muslim youth. Advocate Ravi Chander in his interim report, submitted in November 2007, clearly mentioned that the Muslim youth were illegally arrested and detained by the police and inhumanly tortured and implicated in false cases, Hyderabad based Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee (CLMC), said in a press statement.
National Commission for Minorities took a serious note of the facts revealed in the report and met the victims in the jail as well as their family members and civil liberties and human rights activists and also instructed the Andhra Pradesh government to stop atrocities on Muslim youth.
“Advocate Ravi Chander submitted its complete report to the Chairman, State Minority Commission in October 2008 but the Chairman of the Commission and the Minorities Welfare Minister Mohd Ali Shabbir are sitting on this report and not presenting the facts before people. They are doing so for their personal benefits and also to protect the Congress government. Apart from these people, the Muslim political party that is sitting in the lap of Congress is also trying hard to bury the report, but fortunately TwoCircles.net, which is a news website, flashed this report on its website,” said the statement.
This report confirms all the facts of illegal detention and custodial torture of Muslim youth who were arrested following twin bomb blasts in the city and all the facts which were put before people by the Civil Liberties Committee. If at all the Government had moral responsibility and the Muslim ministers and Members of Parliament had moral courage, instead of becoming hurdle they would have resigned, apologised to Muslims and implemented the recommendations suggested in the report. But it is very unfortunate for the Muslims that they do not have courageous leadership. The present Muslim religious parties and their leaders, instead of having fear of Allah are afraid of the Congress government as they are keeping mum on the issue.
The Ravi Chander Report recommended obtaining a detailed statement from those detained, examining the records with the investigating agencies on police failure to follow procedure, calling for corrective action against the erring police officials, having a rehabilitation scheme for those affected and their families, educating the youth of the local area against problem of terrorism, and constituting a committee with the local police to supervise arrests in the area in the future.
“The government should have implemented the recommendations and apologised to the Muslims but the present Congress government is harassing the Muslim youth,” the statement said.
Lateef Mohd Khan, CLMC Gen-Secretary has appealed to all the Muslims to question every electoral candidate on this report and force them to open their mouth and pressurise Muslim political and religious leaders to speak at least now.
The Ravi Chander Report considered it appropriate to consider the following requirements to be followed in all cases of arrest or detention till legal provisions are made in that behalf as preventive measures:
(1) The police personnel carrying out arrest and handling the interrogation of the arrestee should bear accurate, visible and clear identification and name tags with their designations. The particulars of all such police personnel who handle interrogation of the arrestee must be recorded in a register.
(2) That the police officer carrying out the arrest of the arrestee shall prepare a memo of arrest at the time of arrest and such memo shall be attested by at least one witness, who may be either a member of the family of the arrestee or a respectable person of the locality from where the arrest made. It shall also be countersigned by the arrestee and shall contain the time and date of arrest.
(3) A person who has been arrested or detained and is being held in custody in a police station or interrogation centre or other lock-up, shall be entitled to have one friend or relative or other person known to him or having interest in his welfare being informed, as soon as practicable, that he has been arrested and is being detained at the particular place, unless the attesting witness of the memo of arrest is himself such a friend or relative of the arrestee.
(4) The time, place of arrest and venue of custody of an arrestee must be notified by the police where the next friend or relative of the arrestee lives outside the district or town through the Legal Aid Organisation in the District and the police station of the area concerned telegraphically within a period of 8 to12 hours after the arrest.
(5) The person arrested must be made aware of this right to have someone informed of his arrest or detention as soon as he is put under arrest or is detained.
(6) An entry must be made in the diary at the place of detention regarding the arrest of the person which shall also disclose the name of the next friend of the person who has been informed of the arrest and the names and particulars of the police officials in whose custody the arrestee is.
(7) The arrestee should, where he so requests, be also examined at the time of his arrest and major and minor injuries, if any present on his/her body must be recorded at that time. The ‘Inspection Memo’ must be signed both by the arrestee and the police officer effecting the arrest and its copy provided to the arrestee.
(8) The arrestee should be subjected to medical examination by a trained doctor every 48 hours during his detention in custody by a doctor on the panel of approved doctors appointed by Director, Health Services of the concerned State or Union Territory. Director, health Services should prepare such a penal for all Tehsils and Districts as well.
(9) Copies of all the documents including the memo of arrest, referred to above, should be sent to the illaqa Magistrate for his record.
(10) The arrestee may be permitted to meet his lawyer during interrogation, though not throughout the interrogation.
(11) A police control room should be provided at all district and state headquarters, where information regarding the arrest and the police of custody of the arrestee shall be communicated by the officer causing the arrest, within 12 hours of effecting the arrest and at the police control room it should be displayed on a conspicuous notice board.
[Full text of the Ravi Chander Report can be had at http://www.twocircles.net/files/report_ravi_chander.pdf]