Laws of the land do not apply to MLAs and police

In the wake of the MLAs vs cops episode, will we at least now stop looking down on Bihar as the benchmark of all things uncivilized? A scenario where our elected representatives beat up a law-enforcer for daring to shout at them, and then put pressure on the government to suspend him, is not beyond comprehension. But why don’t these MLAs use their clout to get policemen suspended for other such transgressions not involving politicians?

For instance, post-mortem reports have shown that policemen in Dhule, handling a riot in January, shot dead four Muslims who had their backs towards them.  Isn’t this enough for MLAs from Dhule at least, to press for identifying these policemen and suspending them? There is no  need to wait for the judicial commission appointed to investigate the Dhule riot to complete its inquiry. First, the commission has not yet started functioning. Second, even if it does indict these policemen, there’s no guarantee that action will be taken against them. The example of the BN Srikrishna Commission is  before us. A sitting high court judge, taken away from his normal judicial duties, conducted a painstaking investigation that indicted 31 policemen for grave misconduct, including murder. But the government that appointed the commission ensured that but for five of them being suspended briefly, none of the other policemen lost a day’s wage, forget about spending even a few hours in custody. In the 15 years since the commission’s report was tabled, not once have  our elected representatives  demanded action against these 31 policemen.

Just last month, a policeman repeatedly slapped an IIT student inside his campus, alleging that the boy had abused the police. Students were trying to get inside a hall where ex- president APJ Abdul Kalam was lecturing; security men were telling them to get lost. The students were threatened with arrest, a police van drew up, the face-off turned unpleasant and one student who dared to question the cops was assaulted by a policeman. Surely, the MLA from Powai could have demanded an explanation? Oops! The man in question is MNS MLA Shishir Shinde, often in the news for his brushes with the law.    

The MLAs who thrashed PSI Suryavanshi within the Assembly premises because he had been rude to one of them, were charged with assaulting a public servant, and got bail within 72 hours. But two months back, another set of people who threw stones at the police, ie Muslims in Dhule, were shot by the police for doing so, six of them  fatally.  Again, last August, when a Muslim mob attacked policemen outside Azad Maidan, two were shot dead. The rest were charged with murder and got bail only after spending two months in jail.  Get the message? Attacking the  police is serious business — unless you are an MLA.

On the one hand, we have the deafening silence of our legislators on brutality unleashed by the police on ordinary folk, whom they supposedly represent.  On the other, is the indulgence shown to these honourable men who adorn our state Assembly, when  they turn savage and thrash the police. Together, the two trends add up to this equation: 1) The police can get away with anything as long as they don’t touch MLAs. 2) MLAs are more equal than those who elect them.  So,  both MLAs and police are equally above the law.

The writer is a Mumbai-based freelance journalist.