Sadist Day of India’s Life

The BJP believes only terrorists are tortured in India.

As another session of Parliament rolled by, the Government once again failed to convert the Prevention of Torture Bill into legislation.  That puts India back in the illustrious company of countries like Pakistan, Somalia and Iraq, which have not yet ratified the United Nations Convention Against Torture. The Bill, which was passed by the Lok Sabha, had to be referred to the Select Committee by the Rajya Sabha following lack of consensus among MPs. The most vociferous critic of the Bill is the BJP. While the Left thinks the Bill needs to be more victim-friendly, the BJP argues that it is anti-police and should not be so.

The principal opposition party has built its argument on the premise that terrorism legitimises torture for extraction of information or confessions from the accused. This is absurd reasoning. Can the State or security forces be allowed to torture hapless citizens in the name of fighting terror? The BJP would like you to believe that torture in India is only something hardened terrorists are victims of. Figures tell a different story. The National Commission of Human Rights receives over 100,000 complaints of human rights violations annually. An estimated 6,000 people are tortured every month in the country. Another human rights report released this year shows that custodial deaths in India rose from 900 in the year 2000 to nearly double by 2008. In the absence of a strong law that deters and punishes human rights violators, including those among security forces, such figures will only rise mercilessly.

About The Author

Jatin Gandhi

Jatin Gandhi has covered politics and policy for over a decade now for print, TV and the web. He is Deputy Political Editor at Open.