Dibrugarh, July 12: Assam’s Dibrugarh district administration on Tuesday demolished the house of a man accused of abetting the suicide of businessman Vineet Bagaria, reported.
Bagaria was found dead at his residence on July 7. The police accused four persons – Baidulla Khan, Nishanth Sharma, and Sanjay Sharma, and Izaz Khan – of abetting Bagaria’s suicide. Nishanth Sharma and Izaz Khan are absconding.
District Deputy Commissioner B Pegu claimed that construction guidelines were violated while building the house. “Structure was unstable and could have fallen at any time,” he claimed. “We demolished it under the Disaster Management Act in the larger interest of the public.”
While there are no provisions under Indian law to demolish the home of anyone accused of a crime as a punitive measure, this pattern has been regularly observed across BJP-ruled states. Most of those whose houses have been demolished in this manner have been Muslims.
On June 20, a group of former civil servants remarked in an open letter to Chief Justice of India NV Ramana that the idea of “bulldozer justice” was becoming a norm in the country.
