After Supreme Court rap, Gujarat cops act on custodial death of cow-slaughter accused
Gujarat police register a murder FIR and form a three-member SIT to probe the alleged custodial torture of Zahiruddin Ghyasuddin Shaikh, 64, who died in May after being held in a cow-slaughter case at Vejalpur police station.
Intelligence analysis by Llama
Acting on a July 23 Supreme Court order, Gujarat police have registered a murder FIR and constituted an SIT to investigate the custodial death of 64-year-old Zahiruddin Ghyasuddin Shaikh at Vejalpur police station in May, where he was held in connection with a cow-slaughter case. The FIR alleges officers forced him to swallow around 100 of his own prescription tablets.
A 64-year-old man was arrested over a cow. His family says police hurt him inside the station and made him take a huge number of his own pills, and he later died at the hospital. The Supreme Court told police to investigate, and now they finally are.
Analysis
A Night Inside the Surveillance Room
According to the FIR registered on August 4, the 36 hours between Shaikh's arrest and his death unfolded inside the Vejalpur police station's surveillance room. The complaint, lodged by his son Tofik, alleges that two named constables watched over Shaikh after his formal arrest on May 18, immediately following his discharge from Sola Civil Hospital. The family had handed over his diabetes, blood pressure and thyroid medicines along with the prescription to the police at discharge. By the family's account, no record of the medicines was maintained by the station, no memo was issued for the initial Sarkhej detention, and Shaikh's wife was twice turned away and physically removed from the station when she tried to see him. The most damning element is the two video recordings made at GMERS Hospital at 1.06 am and 1.08 am on May 19, in which, the complaint says, a drowsy but conscious Shaikh named two constables and described being beaten with sticks, including on his private parts, with his beard pulled. Hospital records cited in the FIR corroborated the ingestion of roughly 100 antidiabetic tablets.
From a Cow Case to a Murder FIR
The case began as a routine invocation of the Gujarat Animal Preservation Act over alleged cow slaughter, with the original case registered at Vejalpur police station and Shaikh first taken into custody by Sarkhej police on May 16. The FIR now under investigation challenges both the jurisdictional basis of the Sarkhej detention and the legality of the May 18 re-arrest. The escalation is stark: what started as a case under a state animal-welfare statute has, after a Supreme Court intervention on July 23 directing the DGP to constitute an SIT, produced a first information report under Section 103(1) (murder) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, alongside charges of abetment, hurt, grievous hurt, wrongful confinement, and conspiracy. The named accused span the chain of command — an Assistant Commissioner of Police, the station house officer, the investigating officer, the two constables named in the dying declaration, a head constable who reportedly carried Shaikh to the vehicle, and unidentified staff from both Vejalpur and Sarkhej stations.
A Family's Three-Day Dharna
Outside Vejalpur police station, 15 to 20 men have sat on dharna for three days, demanding accountability in a case that has now attracted the country's top court's attention. The protest underscores a grim pattern in Indian policing: custodial deaths are routinely followed by magisterial inquiries and departmental action, with criminal prosecutions remaining rare. The complaint links the alleged violence to a 2024 departmental inquiry filed by Shaikh's other son, Zeeshan, against the same officers, and a viral May 5 video showing police beating Zeeshan and two others. The Supreme Court's July 23 order, treating the matter as serious enough to bypass the normal state-level investigative hierarchy, signals that the bench viewed the family allegations as warranting independent scrutiny. Whether the SIT, headed by an SP-level CID-Crime officer, can deliver a credible prosecution will test both the Gujarat police's willingness to investigate their own ranks and the broader trajectory of custodial accountability under the new Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
Key points
- A three-member SIT headed by an SP-rank CID-Crime officer began probing the case on Tuesday, August 4, after a Supreme Court order on July 23
- An FIR has been registered under BNS Section 103(1) for murder, along with charges of abetment, hurt, grievous hurt, wrongful confinement and conspiracy
- Zahiruddin Ghyasuddin Shaikh, 64, was held in connection with a cow-slaughter case under the Gujarat Animal Preservation Act; the FIR alleges he was forced to swallow roughly 100 of his own prescription tablets
- Shaikh was declared dead on May 20 at SVP Hospital with multi-organ failure; hospital records corroborated the alleged tablet ingestion
- 15-20 family members have been on dharna outside Vejalpur police station for three days demanding accountability
If the SIT conducts a thorough investigation, the named officers could face prosecution under murder charges, setting a precedent for accountability in custodial deaths in Gujarat. A successful prosecution would also strengthen public confidence in the Supreme Court's willingness to police state-level abuse.
India's track record on custodial death prosecutions remains poor, and SIT investigations into police officers frequently stall. The accused officers retain access to station records and potential witnesses, raising the risk of evidence tampering, while the family and the dharna group could face pressure to withdraw cooperation.
