For every 100 cases filed against Chhattisgarh tribals by the police, 97 are acquitted during the trials
Picked up from a village fair in January 2008, she was then only 17 years old. What followed for a seemingly endless nightmare where she was allegedly chained, beaten, raped and tortured in police custody. Repeated visits to the hospital too followed, so did two surgeries. Earlier this year, she was finally acquitted by a court, cleared of all charges, but not before she had lost seven years of her life in jail accused of ambushing and killing 23 policemen along with 230 other Maoists.
Now 24 years old, she says, "They would drag me by my hair, beat me with whatever they could lay their hands on. I wasn't given any sheet either to cover myself. There were days I couldn't sit, stand or walk. I knew I was going to die there."
Activist Soni Sori, who herself was subjected to brutal torture in Chhattisgarh jails when she was arrested (later acquitted), said, "There were times her condition was so weak, but the police would say they have no staff to take her to the hospital."
Activists and lawyers who helped secure her freedom claim similar cases on trumped up charges are common in Chhattisgarh where villagers are often picked up by the police, charged with non-bailable offences and branded Maoists.
"In her case, her name wasn't there in the original FIR. It was added six months later but the police could not bring even one witness to support its charges," said advocate Vrinda Grover.
This reality is reflected in the large number of undertrials in prison, where jails have 220 per cent undertrials - that's 220 prisoners cramped in a space meant for 100 prisoners.
Another stark reality is the abysmal conviction rate that's just 3 per cent, meaning, for every 100 cases filed by the police, 97 are acquitted during the trials.
Chhattisgarh is dealing with a massive problem of Maoist insurgency with fatal attacks on security forces, but with many tribals arrested for being Maoist sympathisers and languishing in jail for years, it seems in the fight between the state and the Naxals, it's the innocent villagers who end up paying the heaviest price.