A judicial probe was ordered after a 21-year-old youth died in custody of Jaisinagar police in Sagar district of Madhya Pradesh on Tuesday afternoon. The deceased Kritesh Patel, a resident of village Semra Gopalman, was accused of abducting a minor girl from a nearby village.
The parents of Kritesh have alleged custodial torture by the police at the behest of the family of the girl. Sagar superintendent of police (SP) Tarun Nayak confirmed to THE WEEK that a judicial probe (which is a rule in custodial deaths) had been ordered into the incident, but refused to talk in details citing a meeting.
Sources said Kritesh had hanged himself using a towel in the lockup of Jaisinagar police station and was declared dead at Sagar district hospital where he was taken to by the cops. Police officials remained tight-lipped about the exact cause of the death.
Kritesh’s father Raju Patel said while talking to a section of media that a case of abduction had been registered against his son after he and a minor girl from Bamori village had eloped on October 19, following a complaint lodged by the girl’s family at Jaisinagar police station.
Patel said that he himself informed the police of the couple’s presence in Bhopal and had assisted the cops personally in bringing them back to Sagar.
Kritesh was brought to Jaisinagar police station in the wee hours of Tuesday. Patel said that around noon he was asked by the police to go home and come back in the evening. However, later he got a call about the death of his son. He said that his son was perfectly healthy in the morning when he had left Kritesh in the custody of Jaisinagar police. He alleged that the cops at Jaisinagar had beaten Kritesh up along with the family members of the girl and this caused the death.
On September 3, a custodial death was reported from Manpur police station in Indore when a tribal youth, Arjun Singare, accused of dacoity and other crimes died while being in police lock-up following his detention.
According to the recently released report of the National Crime Records Bureau, Madhya Pradesh reported seven custodial deaths in the year 2021, of which one was of a person not in police remand while six were of persons on police remand. Only three custodial death cases were registered during the year but there was no arrest of any cop involved.
