Urgent legal corrections required in Forbesganj police firing case

By Md. Ali, TwoCircles.net,

New Delhi: It’s around a month since Forbesganj police firing took place in which four people were killed by Bihar police. Nothing much has happened when it comes to the judicial enquiry except the fact that, terms of reference of the judicial enquiry has been announced by the government of Bihar.


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Legally speaking there are several lacunas in the case as presented by the victims before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Araria. According to Bilal Kagzi, member of Legal Volunteers, a legal NGO, there is an urgent need to correct legal course of the case otherwise the case might collapse in favor of the accused.


Bullet marks on window of a house in Bhajanpur village in Forbesganj

First and for most, legal steps should be taken in order to ensure that there is just one FIR from the side of the villagers. At present, three separate complaints have been filed by the victims before the Chief Judicial Magistrate. Farooq Ansari, Phatkan Ansari and Rafiq Ansari, kins of those killed by the police, had to approach the CJM to file their complaint when the local police refused to register their FIRs. In normal cases the CJM could have ordered the police to register the FIR but the CJM kept the enquiry to himself.

Now Kagzi says that three separate complaints might end up creating contradictions in the case. So first of all the victims should get their complaints clubbed by filing a petition before the Patna high court and plea the court to direct the police to register an FIR.

Kagzi, who has studied the complaints filed by the victims, says that they should have mentioned the specific roles of the accused in the complaints. For instance out of fear and scare of the local police, the victims didn’t dare to name Garima Malik, the Superintendent of police who was present on the spot when the firing happened. They should include this very important missing element in case a FIR is registered on the orders of the high court. There are enough evidences to suggest her culpability and complicity in the firing in the form of the video which shows her present when Sunil Yadav was jumping on the face of Mustafa Ansari.

The second biggest problem of the case is the three FIRs against the villagers registered by the local police, Auro Sundaram and the block officer. Legal experts say that the villagers should get the FIRs quashed by filing a petition before Patna high court.

What makes the legal correction urgent is the discriminatory behavior by the local police in the whole episode. For instance when the victims went to police station police the local police refused to file FIR against the accused which include some police officers also.

On the other hand, allegedly the same police suggested Sunil Yadav, how to defend himself. Police registered an FIR by Yadav against unknown villagers charging them of attacking him from behind. Yadav is the same policeman against whom after much pressure the police had to file an FIR charging him with murder of Mustafa Ansari.

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