In the last 10 years, the majority (69 per cent) of 1,004 deaths in police custody have been attributed to either illness and natural causes (40 per cent), or to alleged suicide (29 per cent), in National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data.
Details on whether deaths by illness are because of a prolonged or sudden illness, or whether hospitalisation is linked to conditions/circumstances in custody, or owing to assault in custody, are not provided in the NCRB’s annual Crime in India (CII) reports, the key central government database.
More deaths by suicide in police custody have been reported over the past decade, with 36 per cent reported as suicides during 2015-2019. In some cases, however, families have alleged foul play, or that suicides were prompted by custodial torture, a review of media reports suggests.
Physical assault by police has been recorded only from 2014 onward, and in just 6 per…
