Nandita Haksar and Amita Dhanda are names that would make you sit up and take notice. Haksar has written over 15 books, has been on fact-finding missions to Jammu and Kashmir and tackled human rights violations in the north-east. The Union government has utilized the services of Dhanda to suggest legal and policy reform on mental disability. So when the two of them, along with John Fernandes, a senior sociologist working out of the UK, got together to undertake an investigation into the alleged assault on Caurem panch Ravindra Velip, one expected the truth to emerge. On the contrary what was presented to the media on Wednesday was a one-sided version. In fact, the probe conducted by the IGP of Prisons had a wealth of detail and rightly concluded that a magisterial inquiry be instituted.
The general understanding is that a fact finding team should at least talk to the dramatis persona. It must visit the scene of the alleged crime and take on board all versions of the truth before arriving at a conclusion. To the disappointment of many, the three-member team talked to only the complainant and his colleagues who were incarcerated with him. It did not visit the Sada sub-jail, did not talk to the jailors or the IGP of Prisons. It is not know if the team interviewed the doctors at the Goa Medical College, or the lawyer who accompanied the alleged victim or anyone other than the complainant and his colleagues and conveniently assumed that the complainant was telling the truth. By any stretch of imagination, how can this be called a fact finding mission?
The complaint filed with the Vasco police states that the victim was brutally assaulted by four persons. And yet the only injury suffered was a hairline fracture on the left elbow. The fact-finding team had no answer to the incongruity between the claim of a murderous assault and a minor injury. When asked how the victim knew that four persons had assaulted him when his head was covered with a black cloth, the team had no convincing answer. When asked to explain the discrepancy between the claim of multiple fractures and the medical report which listed only a hairline fracture, the team said it had conducted an independent medical examination but refused to share the report or the name of the doctor who had conducted it.
Agreed, more often than not official inquiries tend to go in the direction dictated by the government and rarely inspire confidence. Hence, the burden on independent inquiries is greater and the need to be fair and arrive at the truth more emphasised. Here, the means are as important as the end and the fact finding team failed miserably in adhering to the basic tenet “ talk to everybody connected with the alleged crime.
The three-member team should have appreciated the swift move by the IGP of Prisons in instituting an inquiry even though a copy of the complaint was never submitted to him. The fact that the preliminary report suggested that a magisterial inquiry be conducted and that the government had agreed and promised to complete it in 21 days should have told the three-member team that no one was trying to sweep this one under the carpet.
Civil society in Goa has lost credibility primarily because of its reluctance to sift the wheat from the chaff and a display of utter laziness in studying issues. This picture would have become apparent if the three-member team had made preliminary inquiries before undertaking this task. Also, had it displayed a little patience and waited for the government processes to run their course, the outcome would have been less embarrassing for it.
