Case against Chandauli police after accused man’s daughter dies during raid

Victim’s family accuses police team of murder; local Station House Officer suspended and probe launched

Police in Uttar Pradesh’s Chandauli district have been accused of allegedly beating to death the daughter of a person accused under the Gangster Act after barging into their house during a raid on Sunday.

While the family of the deceased woman, who was in her early twenties, accused the police team of murder, a case was registered against the personnel for culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The local Station House Officer was suspended, even as a probe was launched into the death.

The cause of death remained unknown after the autopsy and the viscera was sent for forensic examination, Chandauli Superintendent of Police Ankur Aggarwal said on Monday. Action would be taken against the police personnel if any negligence was found in the standard operating procedures (SOPs) to be followed by them, he said.

On May 1, a police team reached Manrajpur village under the Sayedraja police station in search of Kanhaiya Yadav with a non-bailable warrant. Yadav had been booked under the Gangsters Act, said the police.

Barged into home

According to Yadav’s family, his two daughters were at home when the police arrived in four vehicles. His younger daughter Gunja Yadav said she and her sister Nisha were on the terrace when the police, including women constables, barged into their home. When she protested, they beat her and took her elder sister Nisha to another room while beating her too and started thrashing them both, alleged Gunja.

Talking to reporters, Gunja said she could hear her sister cry for help from the other room and that Nisha suddenly went silent.

Gunja said that when she questioned the police for beating them, they allegedly threatened to demolish their house. ’You are the daughter of a goonda. We will raze your house. Bring your family to the road,’ they threatened me before going,” said Gunja.

She further said that when she went to the other room, her sister was hanging by the fan. “They killed her and hanged her by the sari,” said Gunja claiming that she saw the police take a chair into the other room.

Mr. Aggarwal said the post-mortem report could not ascertain the cause of death. “Cause of death is unknown,” the SP said, adding that the viscera was preserved and would be sent for forensic examination.

On Sunday evening, the SP had said that prima facie the death seemed to be a case of suicide.

There were no signs of assault or injury marks on the woman’s body, external or internal, except for a minor scratch on her neck and a small injury near her left jaw, said the officer on Monday.

FIR against SHO

An FIR was registered against the SHO and other police personnel for culpable homicide not amounting to murder, voluntarily causing hurt and house tress-pass after preparation for hurt, assault or wrongful restraint, said the SP.

The officer said that everything that happened in the house after the police team went there around 4-4:30 p.m. on May 1 was a matter of investigation. There was no clarity if the body was found hanging or lying on the floor, he said.

Talking to journalists following the incident, Kanhaiya accused the police of harassing him since two years and said they had even forcibly shut down his shop in which he sold cement and other construction material.

He said he was living in Varanasi as the Chandauli police had prohibited from entering the district and that he had only two cases against him, including one for theft of electricity. 

After his daughter’s funeral, Kanhaiya, while talking to a television channel, alleged that she was beaten with police belt on her back, arms and legs and had marks all over the body.

Protest by locals

Angered by the death of the woman, locals blocked a road and allegedly assaulted two police personnel, including one home guard, and damaged an ambulance, said Varanasi Inspector General of Police K. Satya Narayan.

District Magistrate of Chandauli Sanjeev Singh said the injured police personnel were receiving treatment.

The Samajwadi Party has demanded that the police personnel accused in the case be booked for murder.