Reporter's Diary: Are cops afraid of CCTV in their own turf?

CHENNAI: A big question among crime reporters is why did the police team from Kodungaiyur police station take property-offender Rajasekhar (who died in alleged custodial torture on Sunday) from Red Hills to the police booth for questioning and not to the station concerned? And why was he taken to a private hospital initially and not to a GH?

Some reporters believe that they didn’t take Rajasekhar to the police station due to the presence of surveillance cameras at the station. “What’s wrong in taking a suspect to the booth for questioning? The booth at the Eveready colony is also a police building,” claimed TS Anbu, additional commissioner of police, North, in a press conference, defending the team’s decision to take the suspect to a booth.

Cops also defended the decision to take Rajasekhar to a private hospital – it was the nearest hospital and he needed urgent medical care. After doctors there told them that Rajasekhar was ‘healthy’, he was again taken to the booth for ‘resting’ and not to the police station.

At the booth, he developed complications again. This time, Rajasekhar was taken to the same hospital, where the medical team declared him ‘brought dead’. Then the team took his body to Stanley Medical College for autopsy.

The death is now under CB-CID probe. Immediately after the incident, 5 cops were suspended.

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