PHA-Exch> Police planting false evidence in Dr Binayak Sen's case, India

[Claudio Schuftan]

From: Abhay Shukla abhayshukla1 at gmail.com


   Along with Kavita Srivastava, Dipankar and Pranhita (Binayak's brother
and daughter), I had a chance to attend the hearings of Binayak's trial on
30 and 31 July at Raipur. As expected we witnessed the bizarre features of
this trial which have been already observed by many others – large presence
of armed police in and around the court, all entrants to the court being
physically searched and checked with metal detectors, Binayak and the other
accused (Narayan Sanyal and Piyush Guha) being continuously surrounded by
armed police and required to stand in court for long periods of time. What
was new during the hearing on 30th July was the blatant and shocking attempt
by the police to plant false incriminating evidence against Binayak.

 During the hearing on 30th July, the 'incriminating evidence' seized from
Binayak's house was to be presented to the court. With a seizure witness
(one Shyam Sundar Rao) testifying, the sealed packet with the documents
seized from Binayak's house in May 2007 was opened before the judge. Nine
documents which have been listed in the seizure memo and chargesheet emerged
from the sealed packet, along with a set of newspaper clippings. The
signatures of Binayak (who was present during the search) and search
witnesses which were taken during the search, are present on all these
documents as per search procedure. There is nothing specifically
incriminating in these now well known documents, which could have been
recovered from the house of any person who is a Left sympathiser.

 However, the final document that surprisingly emerged from the packet was a
letter 'from Central Committee, CPI (Maoist) to Dr. Binayak Sen', without
any name or signature of person sending the letter. It looks like a plain
computer printout since there is no signature of sender. *This letter was
not mentioned in the list of documents seized from Binayak's house, is not
mentioned in the search memo, is not mentioned in the police charge sheet
framed one year back, and does not have Binayak's signature on it unlike all
the other seized documents. It appears to be a forged, planted document
which has mysteriously appeared in the 'sealed' packet, over a year after
Binayak's house was searched. *

 Binayak's lawyer Mahendra Dubey effectively argued that this letter should
not be considered as evidence, since it was not part of the seizure memo. He
also effectively cross-examined the search witness (who according to lawyers
is a typical 'police witness') and established that there was no basis to
argue that this letter was part of the seized documents. In these
circumstances, we would all hope that such blatantly false evidence would
not be taken into consideration while judging the case.

 It is worth noting here that in all the hearings so far, practically no
specific incriminating evidence has been presented against Binayak. Most of
the prosecution witnesses have turned hostile, and have refused to testify
against Binayak in court despite some of their statements given earlier to
the police. Now although there are more witnesses (a total of 83) most of
the remaining witnesses are of a formal variety or do not relate to Binayak
(they are related to Piyush Guha or Narayan Sanyal). If effect, *the police
is unable to present any specific incriminating evidence against Binayak,
and now in their desperation to indict him seem to be concocting and
planting false evidence.*

 In this situation, it is important that we collectively continue a 'trial
observation' in Binayak's case, and each of us tries to attend some hearings
far as possible (the next hearings are during 4 to 8 August). The presence
of external observers acts as a kind of positive check on the court, since
it reinforces the message that there is much larger public interest in the
trial. Such external presence of course also boosts the morale of Binayak's
family members and lawyers who are confronting a very oppressive situation
in Chhattisgarh. And finally such continued 'trial observation' and
publicizing of any irregularities on a wide scale is the main tool we have,
to attempt to ensure that this highly unequal trial does not lead to
conviction of Binayak on falsely constructed grounds.

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