Falsely arrested while home for daughter’s wedding, expat awarded Rs 14 lakh compensation; amount may be recovered from police

KOCHI: The Kerala High Court has awarded Rs 14 lakh as compensation to an expatriate who was falsely implicated and jailed by the police in a chain-snatching case while he came to Kerala for his daughter’s wedding. The Division Bench said the government may decide whether to recover the amount from the police officers involved- Sub-Inspector P Biju and Assistant Sub-Inspectors Yogesh and T Unnikrishnan.

Justice PM Manoj ordered that Rs 10 lakh be paid to VK Thajudeen of Thalassery, and Rs 1 lakh each to his wife Nasreena and their three children. It was later proved that the real accused was a habitual offender, Sharath Vathsaraj, who has since been arrested.

According to the prosecution’s earlier version, a man on a white scooter snatched a gold chain from a young woman walking on the road. The incident allegedly took place on July 5, 2018, at 12.15 pm at Choorakkalam near Thalassery.

Thajudeen, who was working in Qatar, had come home on a 15-day leave for his daughter’s wedding. On June 11, while returning from his sister’s house early in the morning, his car was stopped at Kathiroor by a police team led by then Chakkarakkal SI Biju. Thajudeen and his family were forcibly taken to the police station.

The police allegedly called Thajudeen a thief and pressured him to confess to snatching a 5.5 sovereign gold chain from a woman at Choorakkalam six days earlier. They showed him visuals of a person on a white scooter committing the crime. Thajudeen denied involvement and asked the police to verify tower location details, but this was ignored.

He was allegedly stripped and interrogated, and taken for evidence collection through public places and relatives’ houses in front of hundreds of people. However, the police could not recover the gold chain or the scooter.

Spent 77 days in jail
After his arrest, Thajudeen spent 54 days in remand custody in Kerala. As he failed to return to Qatar on time, authorities there jailed him for another 23 days. He also lost his job. In total, he spent 77 days in jail in Kerala and Qatar.

Citing these facts, Thajudeen later approached the High Court seeking Rs 1 crore in compensation through his lawyer, T Asaf Ali.

Why was his dignity destroyed?
According to advocate T Asaf Ali, a former Director General of Prosecutions, the SI’s eagerness to gain credit by quickly arresting an accused led to an innocent man being framed. He said the SI, who had only three years of service, wanted to solve the case quickly and face the media. There was no prior enmity between the police and Thajudeen. At the time of the theft, Thajudeen was at his home, about 11 km away from the scene.

Wife exposed the real accused
The truth came out when the wife of the real accused, Sharath Vathsaraj, revealed the details of the theft. She reportedly shared the information confidentially with a police officer who was her former classmate. This led to Sharath’s arrest, helping to prove Thajudeen’s innocence.