MP Police Booked Betul Advocate who was Allegedly Beaten by Cop for Looking Like a Muslim

Bhopal: Three months after the incident, Madhya Pradesh police booked a Betul-based advocate who was allegedly beaten up by the cops on March 23 for looking like a Muslim.

The Betul police has registered a case against Deepak Bundele at Kotwali police station of the city under section 188 (Disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant), 353 (Assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of his duty) and 294 (punishment forobscene acts and songs in any public place) of the Indian Penal Code on June 18, 2020.

Police accused him for violating lockdown norms, using abusive language in public places and assaulting the on duty public servant. However, police took no notice of the victim’s complaint which was filed after the incident at Kotwali police station and to the Betul SP office.

In the police complaint, Bundele had claimed that police personnel brutally assaulted him on March 23, 2020 while he was on the way to hospital for treatment. Bundele who was a diabetic and blood pressure patient for more than a decade received multiple injuries in the alleged police assault and his ears bleed for days after the incident. Nevertheless, the police took no cognizance of the victim’s application and registered a case against the victim instead after three months of the incident.

Interestingly, all the three police witnesses against him in the case belong to the right wing group Hindu Sena of Betual district.

The matter came to light, when MP Police filed a report in the Madhya Pradesh High Court after the victim Bundele knocked the Court’s door for justice when police refused to register a case in the matter.

In reply to the court, the MP Police claimed that Bundele was venturing without a mask when the section 144 was imposed in the city to prevent the Corona virus outbreak. When the cops stopped him, he started abusing the police personnel and began bullying them for being a senior advocate of the High Court.

The police claimed the CCTV footage of the incident had been deleted because the police keep record of only one month’s footage and since the three months has passed of the incident, the CCTV of the incident is not available. But, there were three eyewitness of the incident who belonged to Hindu Sena.

The police, however, failed to clarify why police denied the CCTV footage, when the victim sought it through the RTI a week after the incident.

Commenting over the issue, Bundele said, “With the help of lies and fake witnesses the police are trying to demoralise and threaten me, when they failed to convince me to withdraw the case.”

“The cops first refused the CCTV footage to me and later deleted the footage intentionally because it will expose the police’s lies in the court. However, to back their lies, the police created false eyewitnesses of Hindu Sena. but, the truth will prevail in the court,” He said.

The hearing of the case in the Jabalpur High Court is on June 30 and Supreme Court advocate Ehtesham Hashmi is presentingthe case in the court.

‘Cops mistook you as Muslim and beaten you’

May 17, two police personnel one of them was Assistant Sub-inspector BS Patel met Bundele to convince him to withdraw the case as he was assaulted because ofmistaken identity. Since he sport a long beard, the cops mistook him as Muslim and assaulted him.

MP Police Covid Muslim by Newsclick on Scribd