The Tamil Nadu police’s brutal violence against the state’s weakest citizens

R Dhanalakshmi and Rajarathinam P were at their fish store, in Coimbatore, on September 16, 2023, when their son’s boss phoned. The boss asked if their son, Jayakumar, had returned home. Dhanalakshmi was surprised. It was only 5 pm. Jayakumar, a cab driver, always returned from work late at night.

“That’s when he told me that the police had picked up my son that morning,” 39-year-old Dhanalakshmi recounted. “He told us that the cops assured him that he would be let go quickly.” Their son’s boss told them that he had been taken to the Saravanampatti police station.

Dhanalakshmi was furious that he had waited so long to tell them the news. But she had no time to fret. She called relatives and friends, asking what could be done, and then set off for the police station. Police there did not give the couple any information, but at around 9 pm, they saw personnel escort Jayakumar into a jeep. They did not let his parents speak to him.

The next day the distraught parents returned to the station, only to be told that their son had been moved to the Katoor police station nearby. But when they visited it, police there did not give them any...

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