Four cops suspended after CCTV video shows them ‘planting’ drugs on man

Mumbai: Four police personnel were suspended here on Saturday after CCTV footage purportedly showing them planting drugs on a man during a raid went viral, a senior official said.

Those suspended included a police sub-inspector and three constables, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone XI) Rajtilak Roshan.

The policemen, attached to the Anti-Terror Cell of the Khar police station, raided an open plot of land in Kalina area of the city on Friday evening and detained a man called Daniel, sources said.

But CCTV footage of the incident purportedly showed one of the policemen slipping something in the suspect’s hip pocket.

Speaking to a local news channel, Daniel claimed that the policemen first threatened to frame him in a Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act case, but after realising that their actions were captured in a CCTV camera, he was released.

DCP Roshan told PTI that disciplinary action was initiated against the four cops for not following set procedure and for suspected actions as seen in the video, and they were suspended pending inquiry.

“They reached the spot after getting information about drugs, but everything (they did) is seen in the CCTV,” he said.

An associate of Daniel alleged while speaking to the news channel that he was targeted at the behest of a builder over a dispute regarding the plot where the incident took place.