GUWAHATI: Although there have been no police "encounters" this year, Assam Minister Pijush Hazarika stated in front of the state assembly on Friday last that suspected criminals were shot and murdered as they attempted to flee from detention. The state's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government has reported that over the past two years, police actions in Assam have resulted in the deaths of 30 people and the injuries of 12, but it has insisted that none of these incidents were "encounters," a term frequently used for extrajudicial killings.
On Friday of last week, Assam minister Pijush Hazarika told the state house that there had been no police "encounters" this year, but that suspects had been shot while attempting to flee detention. He stated that since 2019, there have been no "encounter" fatalities in the state.
Hazarika was responding to an inquiry on these killings from lawmaker Aminul Islam of the All India United Democratic Front on behalf of the chief minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma. Speaker Biswajit Daimary had to adjourn the House for an hour as a result of the response, which caused a commotion and led to accusations from opposition members that the administration had misled the House.
30 individuals were killed in 26 documented incidents of terrorists and criminals "clashing with police" over the past two years, according to CM Sarma.
Between May 2021 and May 21 of this year, according to an affidavit the government submitted in June to the Gauhati High Court, 51 persons died and 139 others were injured as a result of police activity.
The affidavit was submitted in response to lawyer Arif Jwadder's request for a CBI investigation into the alleged extrajudicial killings. The suspects were allegedly escaping from police custody when their deaths were deemed "accidental" by the authorities. It insisted that no extrajudicial executions had occurred.
In Assam, two people perished in police operations in 2021, one in 2020, and five in 2019, according to data from the National Crime Record Bureau. According to data for 2021, 65 people managed to elude police custody in the previous year. In a road collision and while trying to flee, two people were killed.
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