Hashimpura verdict is a huge disappointment
The acquittal of all the accused in the 1987 Hashimpura massacre in Meerut is a complete miscarriage of justice. Not only did it take almost three decades for a verdict to be issued, the fact that not a single person has been held accountable for the deaths of 42 persons who were shot in cold blood, makes for a classic case of double jeopardy.
For this travesty of justice, the police and its political bosses are to be held accountable. As the Delhi court, which has been hearing the matter since July 2006, noted, the accused — 16 men from the Provincial Armed Constabulary — had to be cleared because the prosecution failed to identify them, beyond reasonable doubt, as the killers. Much of the evidence was circumstantial, as a result of which the court was compelled to give the accused the benefit of doubt, even though it was convinced of the fact that a grievous crime had been committed.
The almost 28-year-long investigation and trial period only made matters worse. It has been difficult to establish the chain of incidents, evidence has been allegedly tampered with, discrepancies have crept into the eye-witness accounts, and some eye-witnesses have died. Even the preliminary police work done in the immediate aftermath of the incident was shoddy.
A typical example is the police diary, filed with Ghaziabad Police, which reads like the perpetrators' view of the incident rather than the victims' version. It took nine years for the authorities to file a charge-sheet, and even after that, a court date was hard to get while the accused wilfully ignored court summons. Between 1994 and 2000, 23 bailable warrants and 17 non-bailable warrants were issued, to no effect. It was only under public pressure that the accused finally surrendered before a Ghaziabad court in 2000.
They were promptly released on bail and all of them returned to service. The police was investigating members of its own fraternity, hence its callous approach was to be expected. But let there be no doubt that the police and the prosecution were allowed such dereliction of duty because they had the blessings of their political masters. Successive Governments in Uttar Pradesh did little to further the case. This is noteworthy given that all the victims of Hashimpura were Muslims; and the Congress, the SP and the BSP, which ruled Uttar Pradesh through much of these years, leave no stone unturned to brandish their pro-minority, credentials.
Eventually, in 2002, the case was transferred to Delhi. But here too, even pre-trial proceedings could not begin until 2004, as the Government of Uttar Pradesh couldn't be bothered to appoint a qualified Special Public Prosecutor. Finally, when the trial began in 2006, three of the 19 accused were dead. The only silver lining now is that Saturday's ruling by Delhi's Tis Hazari Court is not the end of the road. There are the higher courts. Hopefully, justice will be done, even if in a still longer run.