Justice for Pratima (U.P. Chief Minister)

Subject: Justice for Pratima Singh against her father, SDM VK Dohare

Dear Mayawati ji,

We, the undersigned, wish to communicate our deep anguish at the alarming failure of your Government to defend Pratima Singh from her criminal father, Senior District Magistrate (SDM) Virendra Kumar Dohare, despite the fact that Pratima has repeatedly sought your personal intervention in her battle for justice against her father. SDM Dohare has made continuing attacks and posed serious threats to Pratima's life, as well as the lives of those in her marital family. Dohare is the only man from his very poor Dalit community to have acquired a powerful position in the UP Government.  Unfortunately, he has misused that power to act brutally against his own wife and daughter and also tyrannize his own community.

Mistreated by her own father for the crime of being born female, Pratima Singh went through a very traumatic childhood. However, worse was to follow. When she was in her first year of college, her father started subjecting her to repeated violent rapes. Unwilling to bear a life of terror and unspeakable humiliation, Pratima decided to fight back. She sent written complaints to various authorities, including the Police Commissioner, the Home Secretary and the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh.

Pratima's pleas for help and justice went unheard on account of her father's official status and political connections. In sheer desperation, Pratima ran away from home and took shelter with a young relative, Satya Prakash, who married her so that she could stay with him without inviting stigma. Dohare was not used to being challenged by anyone and he initiated an open war against Pratima, her husband, and her in-laws.

(For a more detailed account of what Pratima has gone through click here).

Dohare was one of the key accused in the murder of Pratima's brother-in-law, Babu Ram, a High Court lawyer who tried to help Pratima fight her battle in court and so aroused Dohare's murderous rage. He was even suspended from his job on this account on April 10, 2003. But he managed to scuttle a fair trial and got reinstated in May 2006, while the case is still going on. In November 2006, Manushi lawyers helped Pratima to challenge his reinstatement in the Allahabad High Court and in April 2007, he was suspended again on the orders of the High Court. But once again Dohare used political influence to get reinstated in May 2007, after BSP came into power in UP.   

Dohare has also succeeded in foisting patently false criminal cases against Pratima's husband, and other male members of the family, including her bedridden father-in-law, who died from the shock of his son's death and being falsely charged with abducting a young girl. In addition, Pratima's in-laws' home has been vandalized and several other family members subjected to violent attacks.

Despite Pratima's courage in the face of systematic terror, all her heroic efforts to get some semblance of justice have been blocked at every turn, pointing to a very serious failure of the institutions of law and governance in UP, including the State Women's Commission and the State Human Rights Commission. Dohare is able to subvert the course of justice because of his influence in the bureaucracy, and most of all by influencing the local police, which gives him a clean chit without giving Pratima Singh and her marital family even a token hearing each time Pratima's case reaches the court.  That is how all the court cases against Dohare get blocked.

The criminal acts of Dohare, his brothers and associates are not just aimed at Pratima Singh. He is notorious for his corruption and terror in that area, especially among vulnerable members of Dalit community. For example, in April 2009 Dohare's younger brothers Constable Surendra Kumar, Rajendra Kumar and Ravindra Kumar subjected a four-month pregnant Dalit woman named Arun Kumari of their own village to such a brutal attack in full public view that it resulted in her miscarriage on the spot. She lay bleeding in the open for a long time. No one in the village dared come to her rescue or even carry her to hospital because of fear of the Dohare brothers. No action has been taken against the Dohare brothers in this case, even though the assaulted woman and her family did lodge a police complaint, despite threats to their lives.

It is very unfortunate that even though UP has made history by electing a Dalit woman as its Chief Minister, Pratima, who herself is from the Dalit community, is living like a fugitive outside UP because neither her nor her husband's life is safe there.

We urge you to take matters into your own hands and come to the aid of Pratima and her endangered marital family to ensure that:

1)      A fair and speedy investigation is carried out into Pratima Singh's charges against her father so that SDM Dohare can be subjected to a speedy trial on charges of rape, murder, abduction, attempts to murder, and implicating his daughter's husband and other family members in false cases;

2)      Dohare is suspended pending his trial so that he is not able to influence or vitiate the course of justice.

3)      Pratima Singh and her marital family are provided adequate protection by the UP government since their lives are in great danger;

4)      The bogus cases against Pratima's husband and other family members be investigated speedily by the CBI and if found to be filed on false and malafide grounds, strict action taken against all those indulging in such illegal acts at Dohare's behest.

5)      The cases filed by Arun Kumari and other victims of Dohare's tyranny be investigated impartially and put on fast track trials.

Thank you in advance for your urgent attention to this life and death matter.

[Note: This petition is sponsored by Manushi]

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