New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh chief minister Adityanath has come out in defence of his police for shooting dead a Yadav youth in a controversial “encounter” killing last week. The authenticity of the alleged “encounter” has been questioned by the family of the accused person as well as the Opposition parties.
Mangesh Yadav was shot dead by the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (UP STF) on September 5 in Sultanpur in an alleged encounter after the police accused him of being part of a gang that looted a jewellery shop at gunpoint in daylight.
Amid widespread outrage from the Yadav community in the state and the Opposition Samajwadi Party (SP), Adityanath has defended his police force.
“You must have seen that whenever one of their mafia proteges or a dacoit is killed by the police in an encounter, it seems like the police has placed its finger on their raw nerve, and then they start an outcry,” Adityanath said on September 8 (Sunday).
Speaking at a government function in Ambedkar Nagar ahead of assembly by-poll elections, Adityanath made the comments targeting the SP, which has not only questioned the authenticity of the Sultanpur “encounter” but also accused the government of targetting Yadavs through vindictive action.
The circumstances of Mangesh’s killing as well as his identity have triggered a political storm in the state. Mangesh’s family alleged that he was forcibly taken from his home by the police in the early hours of September 3 and kept in illegal custody for two days before he was shot dead in a fabricated shootout.
The SP has also accused the police in the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled (BJP-ruled) state of singling out Yadavs in criminal cases.
While Mangesh was shot dead, three other co-accused from other castes, including Thakurs, were arrested after being shot in the leg. The main accused Vipin Singh surrendered before a local court in Rae Bareli a day after the August 28 dacoity in another case, with the Opposition accusing the government of strategically allowing him safety.
Adityanath, who often boasts about sending criminals to ‘Yamraj’, has justified the police action in Sultanpur, which came after the dacoity exposed his claims of running a tight law and order.
“The dacoit was killed in the police encounter… when he was displaying a weapon and committing the dacoity, what if he had shot the customers in the (jewellery shop)? Would the Samajwadi Party be able to bring them back to life,” Adityanath asked.
The chief minister tried to give a new spin of caste angle to the “encounter”.
He said the customers in the jewellery shop, who could have possibly been shot by the dacoits, could have belonged to any caste. “The customer could be a Yadav or a Dalit,” said Adityanath, countering the allegations of caste bias.
He explained how jewelleries were an important part of Indian culture and history, given away during weddings and saved by families for the marriage of their daughters.
“If the dacoit had run away after the loot and the police had no clue, they would say, ‘look there is lawlessness’,” said Adityanath.
“And if the police catch them and take action, and if the dacoit gets killed in an encounter, then the SP is feeling bad,” he said.
Adityanath threatened to continue this strategy of ‘finishing off’ those who pay no heed to the law.
Also read: ‘Killed Because of His Caste’: Opposition Erupts as UP Police Kills Yadav Man in an ‘Encounter’
“Mafiaism will not work under any circumstances. There shall be the rule of law. Everyone will get security and benefit from schemes. But if someone shows a thumb (reject with audacity) to the law, the government will also carry out the act of finishing them off. It will go to any extent to respond to their audacity,” said Adityanath.
While the UP STF claimed that Mangesh was shot dead after he fired at the police while they were trying to arrest him, his family accused the police of cold-blooded murder.
“The police took my son away and murdered him by shooting him,” Mangesh’s mother Sheela Devi said in a complaint addressed to the station house officer of Baksha police station in her native Jaunpur.
In her complaint, a copy of which is with The Wire, Sheela Devi alleged that her son was “murdered by policemen while he was in police custody.”
On August 28, five unidentified persons looted a well-known jewellery shop in Thateri Bazar area of Sultanpur. The five men walked away with jewelleries worth lakhs of rupees.
On the intervening night of September 2 and 3, around 3:40 am police said they shot three persons accused in the crime in the leg in an alleged “encounter” near an intercollege in Sultanpur’s Godawa area. Two of them were shot in their right leg while the third was shot in his left leg.
Police said they also recovered 15 kg of silver jewellery, allegedly from the loot, from the three men identified as Sachin Singh, Pushpendra Singh and Tribhuvan Kori. A police constable Shailesh Rajbhar was also injured in the “encounter”, said police but did not specify if he received bullet injuries. Police said the three men, carrying .315 bore pistols, had fired at the police with the intent to kill.
Another accused Vipin Singh, who has more than two dozen cases, a day after the dacoity, surrendered before a court in Rae Bareli in another previously-registered case.
Also read: Why Supreme Court’s Move to Frame Guidelines on ‘Bulldozer Action’ Is Too Little, Too Late
SP president Akhilesh Yadav has described the “encounter” as “fake” and questioned why the police allowed Vipin Singh to surrender and shot the other accused in the leg while shooting dead Mangesh.
Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi has also criticised the Adityanath government over the incident and said that the “encounter” of Mangesh Yadav “has once again proved that the BJP does not believe in the rule of law.”
“A professional force like STF is being run like a ‘criminal gang’ under the BJP government and the silence of the central government is its clear consent to this ‘Thoko Niti’,” said Gandhi.
He also said that dozens of encounters of UP STF are under question and demanded that they be investigated impartially.
“Has any action been taken against any of those officers till date? After all, who is protecting them and why,” asked Gandhi.
