Enforced disappearances on rise
The rising trend of the incidence of enforced disappearances has come as a rude reawakening for common citizens. That is more so because going by the versions of the victims' relatives, apparently members of different law-enforcement agencies allegedly 'picked up' those persons. Disturbingly, the police, when approached by victims' relatives, are often found unresponsive to their concerns.
A human rights body, Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK), reports that some 74 people have been the victims of such disappearance in the first six months of this year alone. Of those, 16 could be traced, while bodies of 23 have been found. It gives one the jitters, especially, when one compares the current spate of such incidents with the average figures of the past five years.
However much the home minister may deny that these were cases of 'enforced disappearance,' or resort to semantics to call them 'abductions,' he owes it to the public to explain why those are happening in the first place. Even if those are cases of 'abduction', then the responsibility still falls squarely on the shoulders of the police to rescue the victims as well as to arrest the perpetrators.
We believe it is the state's responsibility to provide safety and security to its citizens rather than be in a denial mode virtually giving indulgence to possible abuse of power by those who are supposed to protect citizens.
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