Statement on Gujrath Fake Encounter killing

Communist Party of India (Maoist)

Central Committee

Press Release: May 8, 2007

The brutal murder of Sohrabuddin Sheikh and his wife Kausar Bi in November 2005 in Ahmedabad after arresting them from a bus in Hyderabad is only the tip of the iceberg of the cruel deeds and inhuman acts of the lawless police system in India. The khaki-clad criminals had proved themselves to be paid mercenaries as they had murdered Sohrabuddin after their pockets were filled by the builder lobby of Gujarat and Rajasthan for the ghastly act. And to eliminate all evidence of the gruesome murder they murdered Kauser Bi three days after the murder of her husband at a farmhouse in Gandhi Nagar and her body was burnt in the ravines in Illol village in Sabarkantha district. Kausar Bi was also raped which has become the natural fate of any woman in police custody. These IPS criminals, with the full backing of the BJP governments in Gujarat and Rajasthan, had also eliminated the only remaining eye-witness to their arrest in Hyderabad, Tulsiram Prajapati, in December 2006.

The arrest of the three IPS officers—DIG Vanzara and SPs, Raj Kumar Pandian of Gujarat and Dinesh Kumar of Rajasthan, and their suspension after more than a week following the arrests, is a mere eye-wash as the killings were carried out clearly at the behest of Narendra Modi, the trader lobby and the political big-wigs of the BJP. The Congress, which has been clamouring for the resignation of Narendra Modi, is no less a culprit as its government in AP led by fascist YSR had fully cooperated with the BJP governments in Gujarat and Rajasthan in the illegal arrest of Sohrabuddin and Kausar Bi.

The Gujarat fake encounter is only one of thousands of such cases that have been taking place in various states in the country. In Kashmir alone over 70,000 youth had been killed after being arrested and several women were raped in the past two decades. Mass demonstrations against illegal arrests, murder and rape by the Army besides the central and state police forces have become a daily feature of Kashmir. And these repressive forces are also obsessed with communal bias, particularly against the Muslims, which makes the atrocities more brutal and inhuman.

Mass murders, fake encounter killings, brutal torture and rape, are an inseparable part of the state system in our country. Whether it is the government ruled by BJP or Congress, TDP, DMK or AIDMK, RJD or BJD, or the so-called Left like the CPI(M), or whichever party is in power, it basically relies on state terror and state-sponsored terror to control the masses and to eliminate the opposition. The police, para-military forces and the Indian armed forces are all adept in staging fake encounters and committing indescribable atrocities whether it is on the revolutionaries and the struggling masses in Andhra Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Bengal, Maharashtra, MP, UP, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, the national liberation fighters in Kashmir and North East, Muslims in various parts of the country, particularly in states such as Gujarat. The rape and murder of Manorama in Manipur highlights the plight of women under virtual Army rule in North East. Besides, daily killings of petty criminals, rape and killing of arrested women is a feature of these trigger-happy cruel forces.

The AP police are even more notorious than their Gujarat counterparts in staging fake encounters. They had committed the worst atrocities during the Congress rule under Vengal Rao, Janardhan Reddy and the present YSR's fascist murdering almost 2000 revolutionaries and sympathizers while over a thousand murders were committed during the nine-year rule of the TDP. AP can boast of several Vanzaras who had committed brutal murders after arrests and torture and all of them had got away unscathed as it had always been the policy of the successive governments to carry out fake encounters. Murderous DGPs like HJ Dora, Ramulu, Swaranjit Sen, DIGs like Gautam Sawang, Aravinda Rao, SPs like Balasubramanyam, Srinivasa Reddy, DT Naik, Surendra Babu, Praveen Kumar, Meena, Stephen Ravindra, Murali and many others are all masters in the art of torture and murder of revolutionaries. And all these criminals received promotions and huge incentives from the government for committing these murders. In just over two years since January 2005, YSR's Congress government in AP had murdered several leaders like Vadkapur Chandramouli, Gautam, Jagadeesh, Samala Venkatesh, Jangaiah, Mohan, Karuna and over three hundred revolutionaries and sympathizers after arresting them. And each of these officers is corrupt to the very core as the case of Murali, the SP of Vishakha rural, who is presently in jail for amassing illegal assets to the tune of Rs. 30 crores, clearly shows.

The atrocities in Chattisgarh especially since the launching of the state-sponsored salwa judum two years ago, outstrip the Gujarat fake encounter. Over 500 adivasis had been murdered in the past two years, over 60,000 adivasis were uprooted from the villages, property worth several hundred crores of rupees was destroyed by the armed thugs belonging to the state police, the central forces and the salwa judum goons, and several women were raped. Just a month ago, on March 31, seven tribals were picked up from Ponjer village in Bijapur district and murdered in cold blood by the police-salwa judum gangs. And DGP OP Rathore, the butcher who organized this gory massacre, roams freely in Raipur, fuming against Naxal "atrocities" in true Hitlerian style and justifying this heart-chilling massacre.

Gujarat fake encounter reveals the real face of the political system in India. It is not an exception but the rule in present-day India. It had come into focus only because of the serious internal contradictions within the BJP and among the various ruling class parties. No political party is really serious in stopping the fake encounters as brutal repression is the very basis for the survival of these parties.

The CC, CPI(Maoist) calls upon all the democratic organizations and individuals, people of various nationalities oppressed by the Indian state, and the oppressed masses of the country to build a strong, united and militant mass movement demanding an end to fake encounters, illegal arrests, torture and atrocities against the people by the police, para-military and the Army, and to punish the perpetrators of such heinous crimes.

Azad,

Spokesperson,

Central Committee,

CPI(Maoist)