Four constables, arrested in 2020 for allegedly lynching a 22-year-old in the slums of Juhu’s Nehru Nagar, have been reinstated in the Mumbai Police.
Joint Commissioner of Police Rajkumar Watkar said that four constables Santosh Desai, Digambar Chavan, Anand Gaikwad and Ankush Palve have been posted in the local arms department. Another senior IPS officer said, “All have been posted in various units of the local arms department.”
The four were earlier posted at the Juhu police station when, during a night patrol, they allegedly attacked Raju Velu Devendra, killing him.
The incident happened on the intervening night of 29 and 30 March 2020. A case of murder was registered on the complaint of Raju’s brother Manickam. Raju’s family had alleged that the police had tried to save his men because, soon after the incident, the officers took the digital video recorder of every CCTV camera covering the scene, while the police took it away from the crowd. Tried to present it as case. lynching
His mother Saira Devendra said, “They told us that the residents of Chawl 5 in Nehru Nagar had caught Raju stealing, who thrashed him to death.”
In mid-2020, advocate Bahraiz Irani approached the Bombay High Court, requesting that cognizance be taken of police brutality across the state during the lockdown. Irani later filed a PIL, following which the court directed the police to take action against the four constables. He was suspended last August.
A Special Investigation Team (SIT) was formed to probe the matter. The constables were arrested on 9 September. In October, the SIT filed a chargesheet in which it dropped the murder charges against the constables and instead imposed sections of culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The four were granted bail on November 3, 2020.
A senior IPS officer said the decision to reinstate him was taken recently in a meeting of the committee chaired by the Mumbai Police Commissioner.
Saira said that she will take up the issue of reinstatement of the four in the court in the next hearing.
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