SC Panel likely to submit report by April first week

IMPHAL, March 26: The Supreme Court appointed Commission headed by Justice N Hedgre and hearing six cases of extrajudicial killings in Manipur is likely to submit its report to the Supreme Court in the first week of April this year. This was stated by Babloo Loitongbam, Executive director of Human Rights Alert (HRA) during a press conference at the HRA  office at Kwakeithel today.

It may be mentioned that in September 2012, Extra-Judicial Victim's Family Association Manipur (EVFAM) along with HRA submitted a list of 1528 extrajudicial killings in Manipur that took place since 1979 to 2012 praying for the constitution of an Special Investigation Team (SIT) to investigate into them. On January 4, 2013, the Supreme Court constituted a high power committee to be fully satisfied about the allegations concerning the cases cited by the writ petitioners with Justice N Santosh Hedgre , former Judge of the Supreme Court as the chairman and JM Lyngdoh, former Chief Election Commissioner and Dr Ajai Kumar Singh, IPS retired DGP and IGP of Karnataka as members of the Commission.

The Commission was mandated to make a thorough enquiry into and record a fact finding regarding the past antecedents and the circumstances in which seven individuals were: Azad khan; Khumbongmayum Orsonjit; Nameirakpam Gobin Meitei; Nameirakpam Nobo Meitei; Elangbam Kiranjit Singh; Chongtham Umakanta and Akoijam Priyobarta and to address the larger question of the role of the State Police and the security forces in Manipur.

In the final submission to the Commission on behalf of the petitioners, suggestions were made to form a special investigation team consisting of 25 senior investigation officers from outside the state of Manipur  to take up the investigation and prosecution of 25 serious cases where it is alleged that fake encounters have taken place.

In Manipur 9 district Courts should be separately established to function exclusively as Human Rights Courts in accordance with Section 30 of the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 with the qualification that such courts will be empowered to entertain complaints of human rights violation directly and to devise its own procedure so that these criminal proceedings are completed within a period of 6 months. That it be declared that custodial killings and other human rights atrocities when committed require no sanction for prosecution either under the CrPC or UAPA (unlawful prevention act) or AFSPA as the commission of a human rights atrocity has nothing to do with the performance of public duty.

He said that during the proceedings of the Inquiry Commission in New Delhi  from March 13- 21, the defence lawyer, legal representative of the petitioners and members of the Commission jointly discussed about the overall functioning of security forces in Manipur, apart from the issue of AFSPA.

When the Commission asked both the Defence Ministry and Home Ministry why AFSPA was not removed from Manipur, the ministries said it was under consideration, Babaloo cited the legal representative of the petitioners as saying.

It also raised a serious question to the two ministries as to why the seven-year -old Jeevan Reddy Commission report on AFSPA was not presented in the Parliament till date, Babloo said.