SSSC demands reopening of Pathribal fake encounter case
Source: Hueiyen News Service

Imphal, January 27 2014: Save Sharmila Solidarity Campaign (SSSC), a joint initiative of various organizations & movements, has come out strongly against the Army verdict on Pathribal fake encounter and demanded reopening of the case and immediate repeal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act from Northeast and Jammu & Kashmir.

In a statement, SSSC said it is sad that in the world's democracy, army has once again overruled the CBI and the Supreme Court.

The army has closed the court martial of its officers who were found guilty of fake encounter of Pathribal, J&K by CBI after which the Supreme Court of India had asked the Army to either provide sanction of prosecution against them or to do court martial for these officers.

The army has closed the court martial on the grounds that there was no evidence against their officers, whereas the CBI had already investigated the matter and found that it was a conspiracy where these officers had picked on innocent civilians to create an impression that the militants responsible for the Chhatisinghpora killing have been neutralized.

It was one of the few cases that had managed to go up till the Supreme Court and in which the Supreme Court accepting the CBI version had directed the army to take action in 2012.But dramatically, after two years, the army closed the court martial file on 24 Jan 2014 and therefore to an extent has overruled the CBI and even Supreme Court.

It is also to be noted that how Army opposed the case and argued that no case can be registered against its officers under the veil of AFSPA as it provides impunity and that it requires prior sanction of central government to prosecute as per Section 7 of AFSPA.

Anyone who believes in justice with equality should not accept such rules and must demand to scrap AFSPA.

Even in many other cases, AFSPA has proved to be a draconian law and has abetted human rights violations through fake killings, torture and rapes.

With time, because of the impunity and no sanction granted by central government to prosecute an armed personal, this has became a habit and mindset of deployed security personals and consequently a danger for all those living in AFSPA-imposed areas, the statement of the SSSC observed.

"We believe in truth, justice and peace for all without any discrimination.

We do not support any form of violence and we believe that it is a duty of the armed personnel that they must respect every human being and follow the path of justice and truth rather.

They must know that just by donning the uniform, they do not get any authoritative command of violence or killing, rather they get a responsibility to protect people and not to harm them.

We also believe that being a part of the Indian department of governance, army must respect the investigation and instructions of central agencies as well as of the judiciary," the statement added.

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