Police abuse video: ‘Perpetrators let off, whistle-blower booked’ LEGAL EXPERTS QUESTION ‘SELECTIVE USE’ OF IT ACT

Police abuse video: ‘Perpetrators let off, whistle-blower booked’ LEGAL EXPERTS QUESTION ‘SELECTIVE USE’ OF IT ACT

By MUDASIR AHMED

Published: Fri, 11 January 2013 10:30 PM

 

SRINAGAR: Police investigation into the video-clip showing cops brutally thrashing two youths has drawn flak from legal experts here who say that police have filed a case against the whistle-blower of the video and not the erring cops.
On Wednesday, the police registered a case in Baramulla police station after a 2-minute video-clip surfaced showing scores of policemen thrashing two youth before forcing them to strip. The video became viral on social networking websites amid mass outrage.
However, legal experts said that instead of booking the erring cops under assault and criminal charges, police launched investigation on the basis of a controversial law (Section 66A of the Information Technology Act) that is already under fire for its misuse.
Prominent lawyer and human rights activist Parvez Imroz, while condemning the police said the video is a “glaring testimony of state-wide torture that is being perpetuated upon half a million Kashmiris.”
“When the same kind of torture was carried out by US forces in the infamous Abu Ghairab prison, there was an investigation against the accused and they were punished. But here instead of registering an assault charges against the erring cops, they have started an investigation against the whistle-blower who has dared to expose the video,” Imroz told Kashmir Reader.
“They have invoked Section 66A which essentially books the individual who has uploaded the video in the first place, thereby giving cover to those who are involved in this brutal act.”
Echoing similar views, J&K High Court lawyer Mudasir Naqashbandi said that Instead of filing a case to find who uploaded this video on YouTube, “police should have booked the cops who are involved in this barbaric act under charges of grievous hurt, wrongful confinement and attempt to murder.”
“The Section 66A of the IT Act has no immediate standing in this case because the video clearly shows that cops are involved in this ghastly act. The State Human Right commission (SHRC) should take suo-moto cognizance of this barbaric act committed by cops,” Naqashbandi told Kashmir Reader.
Section 66A of the IT Act reads: “Any person who sends by any means of a computer resource any information that is grossly offensive or has a menacing character; or any information which he knows to be false, but for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and with fine.”
Section 66A was recently in the eye of the storm after it was used by the authorities in Bombay to arrest two young girls. The duo—Shaheen Dhanda, 21, and Renu Srinivasan—who had questioned the Bombay shutdown to mourn the death of Hindu extremist leader and Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray on November 17, 2012, were booked under the Act. The case was withdrawn following public outrage.
Although senior police officials are tight-lipped on the video, a police spokesmen, said that they have not used Section 66A to book the person who has uploaded the video on the YouTube and that it is only a starting point for the investigation.
“The Act involves investigating individuals who have committed crimes relating to Information and Technology with a criminal intent, and let us not jump to conclusions here. This investigation under Section 66A will then subsequently lead us to those cops who were seen thrashing the two youth on the video,” police spokesman Manoj Pandita told Kashmir Reader.

Protest Against Women Molestration In Baramulla

Protest Against Women Molestration In Baramulla

Protest Against Women Molestration In Baramulla

Madrassa funding row: Now, DSEK says funds ‘surrendered’

By MUDASIR AHMED

Published: Wed, 12 December 2012 10:23 PM

SRINAGAR: The Directorate of School Education Kashmir (DSEK), which is under fire over alleged embezzlement of the funds it had received as New Delhi’s assistance for Valley madrassas, now says that a major chunk of those funds has been “surrendered.”
“The un-operated funds of 361.5176 lakhs rupees out of the total allotment of 553.45 lakhs was surrendered ‘as a routine’ at the end of the financial year 2011-12 and the remaining amount of 91.613 lakhs has been remitted by Chief Education officers to government treasuries,” DSEK says in an RTI application filed by Mudasir Naqashbandi and Firdous Ahmed Parray.

The lawyer duo had sought details about lapsed amount and utilisation of the funds by DSEK, the nodal agency for funds distribution, after DSEK reply to a previous RTI in April this year contradicted the total figure provided by the government on the floor of the House.
In the first RTI reply in March, the DSEK had said that it received “only 373.77 lakhs in central assistance for madrassas”. Following the April RTI, DSEK said that it received 553.45 lakhs out of which 100.3194 were disbursed by CEOs to various madrassas.
But, government in a written reply to MLA Langate Er Rashid’s query in the House disclosed that it received Rs seven crores in central assistance for the madrassas in the Valley, out of which only 100.1394 lakh were disbursed.
“The information they have given now on the quantum amount is still ambiguous despite the request for a clarified reply about the declaration of the lapsed amount,” Mudasir Naqashbandi told Kashmir Reader. “Although DSEK has maintained that it received 553.45 lakhs from government of India, the latest RTI raises more questions than it answers.”
In the RTI reply in March, Naqashbandi says, DSEK claims to have disbursed the amount after March 31. “However, in the new RTI application they have said that funds get automatically lapsed after March 31. But in the previous RTI, DSEK said that it disbursed funds to madrassas in Budgam in the month of April this year.  So did they disburse the amount in April in Budgam if the amount got lapsed in March?”
Also, Naqashbandi says, list of all the madrassas who have received the aid “is with us, and they are not 372, as shown in the new RTI by DSEK, but only a handful.”
“I believe the information they have provided is totally misleading and incomplete. We are mulling to take necessary course of action in order to get to the facts,” Naqashbandi added

MADRASSA FUNDING ROW: NOW, DSEK SAYS FUNDS ‘SURRENDERED’