Inquiry report reveals excessive use of force by police ops led to death of ex-HNLC leader

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaSeptember 9, 2022

Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Friday tabled the report of the One Man Commission of Inquiry headed by Justice T Vaiphei into the killing of the former Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council (HNLC) leader (L) Cheristerfield Thangkhiew on August 13, last year. 

In his report, Justice Vaiphei said that the police operation was carried out in a reckless manner which has led to the death of the ex-militant leader.

“Therefore, my finding is that the Tactical Team-I in carrying out the operation to arrest the deceased at his residence on August 13, 2021 at about 3 AM was culpable of thoughtless and excessive use of force, which resulted in the death of the deceased, late Cheristerfield Thangkhiew, which turned out to be avoidable,” Justice Vaiphei said.

“In my considered view, the post facto excuse that none but the deceased was hurt cannot be a valid justification for carrying out the operation hastily and in a reckless manner by the Tactical Team-I,” he added.

The report said the common thread of evidence running through the statements of these state witnesses is that the objective of operation was professed to be simply to capture the deceased alive and not to shoot at him. 

That was the decision taken in the tactical meeting held prior to the operation. 

“In my considered view, the operation was a well-plan, but executed poorly, recklessly, hastily and without proper application of mind,” Justice Vaiphei said adding “In order words, it was a botched-up operation and failing in its objective of apprehending the deceased alive, who would have given valuable information to the police about the subversive activities of the proscribed HNLC outfit.” 

He said the fact that by undertaking such reckless operation, the team completely lost sight of the possibility of harming the family members of the deceased, who were never accused of having anything to do with the nefarious activities of the deceased he was charged of. 

“If the primary objective of carrying out the operation was to capture the deceased alive, the manner in which the raid was conducted unnecessarly gives rise to the impression that that was not so. This is most unfortunate,” he further added. 

Justice Vaiphei however said to his opinion, having entered what could potentially be a lion’s den in darkness without proper planning and without taking adequate precaution, state witness no 4 had taken purely avoidable and unnecessary risk endangering his own life and that of deceased whom the team professed to have not intended to kill him in the first place. 

“In my opinion, the forced entry into the house of the deceased in darkness and the subsequent killing of the deceased was a reckless exercise and tantamount to disproportionate use of force, which resulted in the death of the deceased,” he said while stating that this apparently defeated the very purpose of launching the operation, namely, to capture him alive. 

Stating that the deceased was never apprehended alive; it was thus a futile exercise, Justice Vaiphei said in his report that “Had they waited for about 2 hours or so to let the daylight to emerge, cordoned off the house of the deceased (as they actually did it here) in the meantime and lobbed teargas grenade into the rooms occupied by the deceased and his family, they could have been forced to come out of the house; the deceased could have been easily apprehended by this means. In this way, the safety of the other innocent members of the family of the deceased could also be ensured.” 

He also said, “Both the learned counsel appearing for the state and the family of the victim submitted their respective written arguments…and raised a number of contentions to support their respective cases, but as already observed by me elsewhere, I do not propose to burden this report with such contentions in view of my above findings.” 

“For example, I do not propose to discuss the other evidence available on record to determine as to whether witness No 4 mowed down the deceased intentionally or in self-defence since the materials I could derive from the statements of the three state witnesses are sufficient for me to arrive at my above findings about the culpability of the Tactical Team-I in the manner in which they carried out the operation; the remaining issues are best left to the jurisdictional criminal court to decide,” Justice Vaiphei said. 

Meanwhile, the Commission has also made the following recommendations to the state government to avoid or prevent recurrence of incidents of the kind complained of here and to protect the lives of the innocents from harm’s way.

The commission has recommended that raiding a residential house occupied by civilians in urban areas at night in pursuit of criminals/to arrest them should not be carried out so that innocent occupant(s) are not harmed in any manner.

It said the police personnel deployed for night operation should be provided with night vision devices (NVDs), if they have not been so provided; these devices are available in the open market.

It said the use of tear gas grenades should be made mandatory for the security forces while raiding residential houses in urban areas.

“In the event of raiding such residential houses, the primary consideration should be to avoid endangering the lives of innocent civilians or to prevent avoidable collateral damage.

Sensitization of the police force to respect the human rights of the citizens is the need of the house; a course to that effect may be organized from time to time. 

Henceforth, whenever any raid of this nature is being conducted in urban areas, an ambulance should be made a part of the team so that unnecessary loss of life can be avoided,” the report said.