'Cops asked my son to rape me'

Police officers, including a woman constable, asked a juvenile accused to strip and have sex with his mother inside a police post in Rajouri garden. The woman has lodged a written complaint with the police commissioner.

You may have heard shocking tales of nails being pulled out, beating up of suspects after making them lie naked on ice sheets, rendering of electric shocks etc as part of the police's third degree torture techniques. But if the story of a west Delhi family is to be believed, then the Delhi police has crossed the line between human decency and barbarism.

Wronged: Mukesh Jha with his wife and two sonsu00a0pic/mid day

M. Jha (45), who lives in Mayapuri with his wife Pooja (30) and two sons Raju (12) and Ramesh (10), learnt on May 21 that his boys had been detained by the police on charges of theft (all names changed to protect identity). The husband and wife rushed to the local police station but failed to find the boys. ''

"While returning home from the Mayapuri police station with my wife, I saw a crowd outside our house. While entering I saw a male and a female cop ransacking the place. When we objected and asked about our sons, the cops started hitting us," said Mukesh Jha.

"After beating us black and blue they took us to the Rajouri Garden police post around 7pm. I saw both my sons there; they had been severely beaten. The male and female police officers there started flogging all of us. They wanted to know about theft of certain items from a car," said Jha.

The torture ended at midnight. But only the parents were allowed to go. The children were kept in detention.
"They told me to go back home and come back the next morning at 10. But when we showed up the policemen asked us to go back and return at 4 pm. We went home. But suddenly around 2 pm on May 22, the cops came to our house and took us to the police post," Jha said.

"There they started beating us again. But after a few minutes one of the constables took me and my younger son out of the room and locked it from the inside. I was worried about the fate of my wife and elder son," he added.

Inside the room, something horrible was about to happen. And Pooja found herself right in the middle of it.
"They locked me and my elder son Raju. Then they started questioning us about the stolen goods. When my son and I denied all charges, the constable asked me to strip in front of my son. When I refused the constable started beating me with his lathi and forced me to strip," Pooja said.

"Then the cops asked me to have sex with my son. Both of us started crying and I begged them to let us go. Then one of the constables asked me to have sex with him instead if I couldn't do it with my son. We begged them again and again to let us go. Finally after about one or two hours they released us," she said. Terrified by the whole incident, Mukesh and Pooja went home, silently. But an NGO Society for Social Research Art & Culture got information regarding the episode. And they approached her for justice.

"One of Pooja's neighbours called us and related the whole incident. We found the victims and we encouraged them to file a complaint against the culprit cops. Then on June 8 Pooja wrote a letter to the Commissioner of Police, relating the whole matter. We have already emailed the victims' story to the NHRC," said Shahnawaz Akhtar Khan, an NGO worker.

MiD DAY has a copy of the letter written by the victims. When the accused policemen came to know that the family was planning to take action they allegedly tried to bribe them.

"They gave us Rs 3,500 and told us to go away from the area. But I declined and returned the money. They later offered me Rs 20,000 to back off," Jha claimed.

- ''All names changed to protect identities.