Truth about fake encounters revealed by killer cop

January 2, 2018 376 Views No Comment

In a short film, Thounaojam Herojit tells The Wire how he came to kill over a hundred men – and why he chose to confess.

In January of 2016, police commando Thounaojam Herojit made a confession in the Imphal Free Press that he had shot dead an unarmed young man in Manipur’s central market.

In July the same year, in a report in the Guardian, Herojit confided that it was not just one man he had killed – it was well over a hundred.

Herojit insisted that he had always acted on orders from superior officers, and now wanted to reveal the truth about the larger system that authorised the executions.

Security forces in Manipur have been accused of routinely staging armed encounters to eliminate both suspected militants and civilians. The practice allegedly peaked in 2008-’09, when the onus of the counter-insurgency had been shifted to state police. The government has denied that executions take place, and provides broad immunity to security personnel for deaths that occur.

Herojit’s shocking confession came just as a new challenge was being mounted against state impunity in Manipur. The Extrajudicial Execution Victims’ Families Association of Manipur, or EEVFAM – a group that Babloo Loitongbam helped convene – had petitioned the court to investigate 1,528 cases of fake encounters it claimed to have documented.

Watch the full video and story in the link below