When police officers in the movies resort to extra-judicial killings or use force more than is necessary to restrain an accused or go about blatantly doing acts that would fall under the ambit of police brutality, they are cheered on, celebrated and their acts of cruelty are equated with justice. This is either an attempt to normalize acts of brutality or praise them and in no way is that acceptable behavior. However, due to a slow judicial process and low conviction rates, many people have come to see these acts as acts of immediate justice instead of acts of extreme brutality and flagrant dishonor of the law.
Per reports of the National Campaign Against Torture, police brutality in India is not a new phenomenon. Despite a nationwide lockdown, India witnessed an increase in custodial deaths during the last year and over one suicide per week because of alleged torture in police custody. Around 74.4% of the deaths in police custody took place due to alleged torture and extreme brutality, but most of these deaths were written off as those caused by various medical conditions. Even in cases with an overwhelming amount of evidence, police killings rarely result in severe punishment. From time to time, a few officers are arrested, but convictions come few and far between.
Under this project at LQF, we will be creating awareness regarding police misconduct and the active role that citizens can play in mitigating this phenomenon. In addition, we will deal with issues like filing complaints with the appropriate authorities for police misconduct, the correlation between gender, caste, religion, and police brutality.
To accentuate our advocacy efforts, we will be engaging with academic experts, government officials, and other vital individual stakeholders and draft recommendations for the Government stakeholders to bridge the gap between existing policies and their practical implementation.
If you wish to be a part of this project, you can reach out to us with an SOP (not more than 300 words) and your updated LinkedIn Profile Link at [email protected].
Note: We will keep updating information on varied aspects of this project on this webpage and on our Social Media Pages. Follow us on Instagram to receive the latest updates at our end.