Two men accuse police of forcing them to testify against Maoist Roopesh in Coimbatore District Court
The Hindu
Two men accuse police of coercion to testify against Maoist, threatening with licence suspension and false cases.
Two men from R. Ponnapuram near Pollachi have accused the police, mainly officials from the ‘Q’ Branch, of forcing them to testify against alleged Maoist Roopesh before the Coimbatore District Court.
They also alleged that the police threatened them of getting their driving licence suspended and implicating them in ganja and illicit liquor cases.
M. Selvaraj, 39, and T. Sakthi, both relatives and residents of Arivoli Nagar at R. Ponnapuram, have alleged that they were falsely implicated as witnesses in a case against Roopesh registered by the Pollachi taluk police in 2016, which is handled by ‘Q’ Branch. The case relates to alleged procuring of a SIM card by Roopesh using identification documents of C. Panchalingam, a resident of R. Ponnapuram, before his arrest near Karumathampatti in Coimbatore in May 2015.
Mr. Selvaraj and Mr. Sakthi received summons from the district court that instructed them to appear to give evidence in the case on June 26.
“At the public prosecutor’s office, we were asked to testify against Roopesh, whom we have not seen or heard of. When refused, the police threatened to implicate us in other cases. How do we testify against an unknown person? If the police continue to harass us, tarnish our names and deprive us of our livelihood, there is no option left but to end lives”, said Mr. Selvaraj, a driver by occupation, to The Hindu.
Mr. Selvaraj’s brother’s son P. Nagaraj ended his life on July 1, 2016. He and Mr. Sakthi had visited the Pollachi taluk station with regard to the incident.
“The police got our signatures on a blank sheet of paper. We were told it was for the formalities to release the body of Nagaraj. The police misused the signatures and used it for a fake statement that we had seen Roopesh in 2014 in our village,” Mr. Selvaraj alleged. The statement said that Roopesh also spoke to them about Maoist principles and asked them to join the organisation.
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