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What Democracy is
this? In the very heart of Delhi’s plush colony, Vasant Kunj, at 9.00 pm on
Feb.7th Professor S.A.R.Geelani is shot four times, from close range and the
killers escape, supposedly without a trace. All suspect the hand of the Delhi
police in the attempted murder, who claim they only heard of the incident from
the press.
Geelani had just got
out of his car near the flat of his lawyer, Nandita Haksar, who he was visiting
in connection with his case. After being shot he managed to reach Haksar’s house
who rushed Geelani to AIIMS hospital. He was unconscious and was operated on as
his intestine had been ruptured at ten places. The police threw an armed cordon
around Geelani and did not even allow his wife to see him that night, until the
press intervened.
Geelani had been
sentenced to death by the trial court in the Dec.13th 2001 Parliament attack
case. After 23 months of incarceration and torture in jail and the police
station he was finally acquitted by the Delhi High Court. But the Delhi police
will not sit quiet; they have challenged the acquittal in the Supreme Court.
Also they have been systematically harassing him — threatening calls, systematic
trailing, abuse by hoodlums while traveling to college, had all become part of
the daily life of Prof Geelani.
His wife said, with
tears in her eyes and the young 9-years old son by her side, that "While this
is the first time that threats have taken such an ugly turn, we have been
complaining about the bullying and the fear that we have been living under. In
fact while we haven’t made any formal complaint till now, when my husband went
to Goa last year he was followed and then we made a formal protest, but nothing
came out of the complaint. The threats continued and today we are here."
Geelani’s counsel, Ram Jethmalani, said his client had expressed apprehensions
about the threat to his life from the Delhi Police as far back as March 2004.
Arundhati Roy, Nandita Haksar and a large number of human rights activists have
accused the Delhi police of masterminding the attack, and have demanded a
judicial enquiry into the incident. Some claimed that "the police have been
trailing him ever since his acquittal. They were there after him all the time,
but they were not there when the incident happened." Even while he was in
jail numerous attacks had been made on his life — with blades, knives and even
poisoning — by hoodlums instigated by the police.
On the very next day
of the attack, hundreds gathered outside the Delhi Police Headquarters and
submitted a memorandum to the Home Minister and the Prime Minister. Those
present were social activists, human rights and civil liberties activists, and
large numbers of teachers and students. Some of the organisations represented
were, PUDR, PUCL, DUTA, a large number of renowned intellectuals, and teachers
and students from JNU, Delhi University and Jamia Milia Islamia. They shouted
anti-police slogans, putting the direct blame on the police. The memorandum
submitted demanded an independent judicial inquiry into the attack. It also
demanded a White Paper on the Parliam-entary attack case and the institution of
a high-level judicial inquiry into the illegal practices of the Delhi Police’s
Special Cell. DUTA (Delhi University Teachers’ Association), at its General Body
Meeting on Feb.11th called for a "University Bandh" on Feb.12th against the
murderous attack on Prof. Geelani.
Today, as the country
slips deeper and deeper into the arms of the imperialists, particularly the US,
the country is being turned into a hell hole where no one is safe from the mafia
state. To prop up its carpetbagger economic loot, crimilalisation is there in
all spheres of the establishment — business, politics and the state machinery.
Safety can only be secured through a counter force that takes on this goonda raj.
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