The Madras High Court on 29 September upheld a lower court's verdict and sentencing of 215 Tamil Nadu government officials for the notorious Vachathi incident.
High Court of Madras. (Creative Commons)
The crowd was swelling outside the District Hospital in the Dharmapuri district of Tamil Nadu as the night progressed on 18 October, 2004. Special Task Force members in camouflage beamed proudly, even as former personnel rushed to the scene to be a part of the goings on and for a re-confirmation.
The confirmation was lying inside, silent and slain on the post-mortem table, two holes visible on the face. A few hours ago, the Tamil Nadu STF led by K Vijay Kumar had gunned down Koose Munisamy Veerappan, the dreaded forest brigand, near the Seventh Day Matriculation School at Padi, around 10 km from the hospital.
The brigand’s consigliere Sethukuli Govindan and lieutenants Chandre Gowda and Sethumani were also with Veerappan — without his trademark moustache and looking too ordinary — in his last journey in an ambulance, a redone police vehicle with “SKS Hospital, ‘Selam’,” painted on its body.
Govindan, Gowda, and Sethumani, too, were killed when the seed box — a sugarcane-laden lorry — waylaid the ambulance, facilitating the police ambush.
The ambulance took fire, still the glaring mistake, “Selam” — instead of Salem — remained visible till the police covered the vehicle with a rust-coloured tarpaulin sheet. By then, all four were dead and Operation Cocoon was over.
“Selam” was not the only mistake the police and other officials had committed in their desperate hunt for Veerappan — a wild animal with a human brain, as the then STF chief Kuimar would later describe him — in the unforgiving but majestic terrains of Male Mahadeshwara (MM) and Mylamala Hills.
Almost 19 years after Veerappan’s elimination, the Madras High Court on Friday, 29 September, upheld the order of a lower court in Dharmapuri convicting and sentencing 215 people for atrocities on tribesmen, including sexual assault of 18 women, during a raid for smuggled sandalwood at Vachathi village in Dharmapuri’s Petatampatti panchayat in 1992.
The convicts comprised 126 forest personnel, including four Indian Forest Service (IFS) officers, 84 policemen, and five from the Revenue Department. Originally, the accused numbered 269, but 54 died during the pendency of the trial.
The Dharmapuri Principal District and Sessions Court sentenced them to imprisonment, ranging from one to 10 years, after the judge, S Kumaraguru, convicted the accused on 29 September, 2011. Coincidentally, the high court upheld its verdict and sentence on another 29 September, after 12 years, in 2023.
While upholding the lower court’s verdict, Justice P Velmurugan also directed providing an immediate compensation of ₹10 lakh to the 18 women who were victims in the case. Of this amount, the court directed recovering ₹5 lakh from those accused of rape, the counsel for the survivors said.
“Government to provide suitable jobs either by self-employment or through any other means to the victims. Stringent action shall be taken against the then District Collector, Superintendent of Police, and the District Forest Officer,” the judge said.
Justice Velmurugan visited Vachathi on 4 March this year and interacted with the villagers, specifically those who suffered the atrocities.
Whitewashed, lookalike tile-roofed houses lined one side of the street at the heart of the village on the foothills of the Sitheri mountain range, inhibited predominantly by the Malayallee tribespeople. The day, 20 June, 1992, was like any other, and the villagers were engaged in their daily routine.
It turned into a nightmare as forest and police personnel, accompanied by revenue officials, raided the village.
The villagers alleged that they ransacked their hamlet, assaulted men, killed cattle, contaminated their source of water, and bundled 18 women into a truck. The villagers said the women were raped and brutally assaulted.
Earlier in the month, the villagers had reportedly prevented the officials from entering the village. They came back with forces and committed the atrocities on the pretext of searching for sandalwood and gleaning information about Veerappan, the elusive fox.
The villagers, along with the women, were made to stand in front of a pile of sandalwood and photographed before the officials whisked 105 villagers away and put them in remand. The raid continued for two days. The Forest Department later said 60 tonnes of sandalwood were confiscated from the village.
After their release, the 18 women hid in the Sitheri hills, fearing a repeat of 20 June.
They first complained about the atrocities to the Harur police. The police reportedly did not file a First Information Report (FIR) since they did not find the narrative credible.
The incident sent shockwaves across the country, and a hue and cry followed. The movies Vachathi and Viduthalai Part 1, depicted the gruesome incident. However, the then state government headed by J Jayalalithaa kept denying the charges.
The CPI(M) took up the incident and moved the high court on 30 June, 1992. The court, however, rejected the public interest litigation (PIL) on the premise that government officials would not be involved in such brutality.
The Left party soon approached the Supreme Court with a writ petition. The apex court referred the matter back to the high court with a directive to expedite the proceedings.
In February 1995, the high court ordered a CBI probe into the incident. The next year, the Dharmapuri court was assigned to take up the trial. The case, however, dragged on, and another writ petition was filed after six years.
The delay caught the attention of the National Human Rights Commission and the media. Meanwhile, the CBI recommended the prosecution of 269 people on charges of assault, illegal detention, rape, and concealment of evidence.
On 29 September, 2011, the Dharmapuri court delivered its judgement. The officials challenged it in the high court, which upheld the order 12 years later., on 29 September, 2023.
“All the criminal appeals are dismissed as devoid of merits and substance…,” Live Law quoted the judge as saying.
(With PTI inputs)
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