Ram Shanker Singh

Retired army man Ram Shanker Singh was a part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force deployed in Sri Lanka for three years and protected the country’s frontier for over two decades. Ten years after retirement, he is running from pillar to post to prove his innocence.

A resident of Sahalichak village under the jurisdiction of Maner police station in Patna rural, he claimed to have been falsely implicated in a case of theft and robbery in 2012. Policemen are after him since then.

Maner police have allegedly threatened to arrest the former soldier and his relatives. “My elder brother Phulchandra Rai was earlier arrested and sent to jail. Now they (policemen) are threatening to arrest me and my son Sanjay Kumar, also employed in the Indian Army,” a visibly upset Singh told The Telegraph.

He said the alleged robbery incident in which he had been dragged into occurred on a day he was on duty at the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) refinery in Barauni. “After the retirement from the army in 2003, I was employed as chief guard in the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) and deployed at the IOC, Barauni, in 2005,” he said.

Singh claimed that he submitted the documents in his favour right from the station house officer (SHO) of Maner police station to the director-general of police (DGP). But nobody ever bothered to listen to his grievances. “Finding no way out, I appeared at the chief minister’s janata durbar twice on February 4 and February 11 this year and sought his intervention,” he said.

Thereafter, he knocked on the door of the governor and submitted a petition to his office on April 5, 2013. He again appeared at the Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP)’s janata durbar on May 16 and pleaded his innocence.

“The SSP took notice of my complaint and asked the Danapur sub-divisional police officer, S.K. Saroj, to look into the matter. But nothing has happened so far,” he said, adding that he also sent his petition to the inspector-general (IG) of CISF seeking intervention. The office of the CISF’s IG wrote a letter to the Patna district magistrate on February 26 this year, requesting the latter to take action and provide relief to the aggrieved ex-army man.

The “partial” role of the Maner cops is more shocking for Singh. In his petition to the DGP Abhayanand, the former soldier alleged that his elder brother Phulchand Rai had lodged an FIR against Harendra Rai, Birendra Rai, Ajit Rai, Nagendra Rai, Shambhu Rai and Arvind Rai after he and other family members were brutally assaulted.

“Instead of bringing the culprits to book, the investigating officer, Ajay Kumar Jha, has threatened to sue us,” Singh alleged.

Patna SSP Manu Maharaj said he would personally look into the complaint of the retired soldier.