As gangster Vikas Dubey continues to evade arrest, four days after his men killed eight police personnel who had been sent to arrest him, a fresh controversy has erupted after it became known that one of the eight policemen killed had complained about a nexus between Dubey and the police.
On Monday, 6 July, photos of a letter by Deputy Superintendent of Police Devendra Mishra in March began going viral, in which he complained to the senior officer of the Kanpur Nagar police about how an FIR against Vikas Dubey had been modified at the behest of the Chaubeypur police station SHO/SO Vinay Tiwari. Mishra led the raid to arrest Dubey, and was one of those slain by Dubey’s henchmen.
Independent of this letter, Tiwari has now been suspended as part of the police probe into whether Dubey was tipped off about the raid, allowing him to ambush the policemen, according to the Indian Express, who also report that three more personnel from the same police station had been suspended on Monday.
However, questions are now being asked about why the police are unable to find the letter by Mishra, and why no action was taken at the time it was written.
WHAT DOES THE LETTER SAY?
In the letter that Mishra is supposed to have written to then district Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Anand Deo, he notes that an FIR was registered against Dubey and others on 13 March at the Chaubeypur police station under several provisions of the Indian Penal Code, including causing grievous hurt (Section 323) and criminal intimidation (Section 506).
Crucially, the FIR also included Section 386 – extortion by putting a person in fear of death or grievous hurt – which was important to include, given the facts of the case.
According to The Indian Express, the FIR had been filed by a woman from Bikaru (the same place where Dubey ambushed and killed the eight policemen), Roli Shukla, who claimed that Dubey and five others had broken into her house, beat her up and threatened to kill her family unless they paid Rs 2 lakh. Three of the people named by her are also named in the FIR filed by police in relation to the incident on Friday, 3 July, when Dubey’s men ambushed the police officers sent to arrest him.
Mishra’s letter claims that he had directed Tiwari to take strict action against Dubey, and that he had informed the SSP about the incident. However, when no action on the case took place, he checked the records and found that Section 386 had been removed from the FIR, and the incident was being considered one of old enmity.
The modification of the FIR was done, according to Mishra’s inquiries, at the behest of SHO Tiwari, who allegedly frequently visited and talked with Dubey.
WHAT ARE THE COPS SAYING ABOUT THE LETTER?
The Inspector General of the Kanpur Range police, Mohit Agarwal told media personnel on Monday that the police were looking into these claims about the letter, and that he had asked the current SSP to submit a report regarding when the letter was sent and what action was taken regarding it.
The current SSP of the Kanpur Nagar police, Dinesh Kumar, put out a statement in which he acknowledged that an alleged letter by the late DSP Mishra had gone viral on social media, and that this letter claimed that Section 386 was removed from an FIR against Vikas Dubey.
Kumar said that in the preliminary investigation, they had checked several official records, including at the office of then-SSP Deo, but could not find any mention of the letter, or of any complaint against the SO (Tiwari).
However, he said that the police would continue to look into the matter and try to confirm if the letter was genuine.
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)