§ Mr. MACKARNESSasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether at Bahraich the sessions judge has recently sentenced to long terms of imprisonment two inspectors of police, a sub-inspector, and several constables for conspiring to fabricate false charges and for arresting 15 innocent men for being concerned in a dacoity and extorting confessions of guilt from some of them, when in fact the supposed dacoits were police agents concealed, dressed up, and armed as such by the police, and in fact no dacoity had been committed at all; and, if so, whether he can say what steps the Government of India proposes to take to reform the system under which such abuses can occur?
The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (The Master of Elibank)The officers convicted were one inspector, two sub-inspectors, and seven constables, and the sentences, as I stated yesterday, ranged from seven years to one year. The need for improvement in the Indian police system is not denied, and the hon. Member is aware of the measures that have been, and are being, taken to improve the personnel and administration.
§ Mr. MACKARNESSasked whether the Secretary of State has been made aware of the cases which have recently occurred in which findings of the judiciary in India that the police has been guilty of ill-treating witnesses and extorting evidence from them by illegal means have been dissented from by the Executive in reliance solely upon secret inquiries held by the police officials; and whether, in view of the want of confidence likely to be produced in the public mind by such a procedure, the Secretary of State will consider the desirability of some public and indepen- 538 dent form of investigation into police misconduct suggested by the judges?
The MASTER of ELIBANKThe Secretary of State is well aware of the cases referred to and he would observe that it is not correct to say that they occasioned "findings of the judiciary that the police has been guilty" of the malpractices mentioned in the question. So far as the judgments animadverted on the police, they expressed suspicion only, and stated that the facts should be further inquired into. In response to this invitation inquiries have been held by the Executive Government in such manner as seemed to it best calculated to elicit the facts. No disrespect whatever or want of confidence in the court is implied by this procedure, and the Secretary of State does not think it necessary to give any orders on the subject.
§ Mr. MACKARNESSasked whether the attention of the Secretary of State has been called to a case recently tried by the chief court in the Punjab, in which three Indians were charged with falsely accusing three fellow countrymen of the murder of a woman at Islamia, and were acquitted by the judges, ill which it appeared that, though no murder had taken place at all and the woman had only left the district, the men were driven by ill-treatment on, the part of the police to confess that they had not only murdered her but seen her buried; and whether the finding of the judges of the chief court to this effect has been set aside by the Executive after a secret police inquiry, and the police concerned have been entirely exonerated?
The MASTER of ELIBANKThe Secretary of State has no official information, but he will inquire. From the newspaper reports it does not appear that the false confessions were extorted by the police, who moreover did not act upon them.