Date:28-03-2017

To

The Station House Officer

In-Charge, P.S. Deolali
District Nasik, Maharashtra.
Attn. Mr. Lokre, Investigating Officer

Subject: Complaint with evidence with with regard to unnatural

death of Gunner Roy Mathew under suspicious
circumstances and cogent material and circumstances
pointing to involvement of serving Colonel Anit Jethania
posted at Deolali Cantt and some other officers acting in
cahoots with him.

Sir,

The complainant Applicant is Associate Editor at the Web News Portal The
Quint.

At the outset, the statement given by the complainant to you Mr Lokre on

March 22 at Deolali be treated as part and parcel of this complaint, and
contents of such statement are not being repeated for brevity, being part
of record, and due to the constraint of your not furnishing a copy to me.

The Complainant had in response to your email and phone call on March 20
in the late evening had forthwith made herself available to you for recording
her statement from morning 10 am to late night on 22nd March 2017
continuously, after having already sent on email the video of the story as
well as raw footage, as well as by courier, and with covering email
explaining the context of the video.
During the recording of statement, Complainant tried to give the details of
conversations she had on record with the family of Late Roy Mathew but
you hurried her up to take her to Deolali camp to physically confirm the
spots and sign various Panchnamas.
After that you gave a clear impression that your assessment of the matter
will require further investigation and she would be called again and by that
time she should transcript all conversations on record and chat logs. You
gave a clear impression that she will get an opportunity to highlight aspects
which help to go to the root cause of the death and bring out the truth,
which she was emphasising from the very beginning in her emails to you.
In her statement she had duly pointed out to the aspect that the suicide, if
indeed is a suicide, is due to harassment meted out to Mathew by those
army officers who were apprehensive of being penalised for their
misconduct revealed in the video, that death of Mathew is death of a
potential witness and is required to be probed from that angle with highest
level of scrutiny to rule out any possibility of foul play, particularly the role
of his reporting officer in not allowing the family to lodge a missing persons
report till his dead body was found. You told the undersigned Complainant
it will be better to record all these elements in her subsequent visit, as no
time was left after her thoroughly answering questions through the day and
you insisted first on visiting the site and then only other aspects could be
better gone into once she has collected and collated all the material
together, and since this is very sensitive case she should not give half
prepared material.

However, she was totally surprised and disappointed to see a story in Indian
Express this morning that you have decided to abruptly lodge an FIR
without completing the investigation, apparently for motives best known to
you which have no connection with either justice or the quest to find the
truth which you were duty bound to determine through a fair investigation.
Another surprising angle is that this abrupt lodging of FIR is allegedly at
behest of those very suspect rogue officers as material and circumstances
overwhelming suggest could be the very persons who carried out
harassment of Mathew leading to his suicide, an aspect you were duty
bound to probe and rule out every possibility of before filing FIR.

It is under these circumstances that I am making this complaint formally

with the evidence I have and I am providing to you in attachment, to
register a case and enquire into the role of the rogue army officers to find
whether it is their acts of harassment of Mathew and other jawans in string
video to cover up their own misdeeds and escape consequences has led to
Mathews suicide by putting the fear of court martial in his head, when only
such rogue officers who exploited sahayaks despite circular were required
to face a court martial and never Mathew who was not even aware his
conversation and casual remarks were being recorded, as such could not
be proceeded against at all.

In her statement to you on 22nd March, Complainant had already stated the
chronology of events and mentioned the fact that an internal inquiry against
the jawans were on. Also that gunner Roy Mathews family contacted me a
day before his body was found in the abandoned barrack in Devlali.

The sequence of events Complainant narrated in her statement revealed

that the harassment of jawans featured in the video started the very same
day after video was uploaded on February 24, while the version which the
rogue officers has managed to be put out by army that none of them was
questioned by army till Mathew was found dead, points out to a cover up
and distortion and suppression of truth, to mislead investigation and
prevent real perpetrators being booked and held to account by law. The
Complainant had duly conveyed her apprehensions to the Chief of Army
Staff on March 6, 2017 itself.
The video and the article was posted on the web portal The Quint on
24.02.2017. Video was duly sent to Army PRO with request for
comment/reaction on it. On 25.02.2017 morning Complainant received
many calls regarding the expose that the news has spread around and
whole official establishment of Cantonment at Deolali is actively seeking to
disclose the identity of Jawans involved in the conversation with the
complainant.

Very next day started receiving concrete information about coercion and
harassment of those who featured in the video, and all such material on
record with complainant is provided to you. By that time it was evident to
complainant that all jawans having conversation with the complainant had
been identified by rogue officers of Cantonment Establishment specifically
Gunner Mathew, who had gone missing.

On 28.02.2017 complainant received message on Facebook Messenger

from Brother-in-law of Gunner Roy Mathew seeking help in finding him.
Complainant asked for telephone no of Father of Gunner Roy Mathew from
his brother in law, which was given on 01.03.2017. When complainant
contacted Father of Gunner Mathew, he told the complainant that Roy has
not called home for last many days. Father of Gunner Roy Mathew further
told Complainant that on inquiry from Colonel Anil Jethania to whom he
was attached as Sahayak did not receive any proper response. Father of
Roy Mathew had given mobile no. 8769622716 of Anil Jethania with request
to inquire about him. However to the shock of Complainant she received
call from cousin of Gunner Mathew named Jijo Jose on 02.03.2017 at 11.30
AM that Roy Mathew has expired. Jijo Jose to complainant that Father of
Roy Mathew has been informed by Army Officers that he has committed
suicide. The Officer further informed that the dead body of Roy Mathew has
been recovered from place which was 3 Kms away from the actual place of
residence of Roy Mathew. Complainant has been in conversation with Sister
of Gunner Roy Mathew right from the beginning i.e. from 02.03.2017 and
in one of the chats she told complainant that prior to recovery of dead body
one of the Army Officers named Col Anil Jethania had infact
persuaded/dissuaded Father of Roy Mathew not to file Missing Complaint.

Instead, you have seemed to buy lock stock and barrel the explanation to
dress up the suicide set up by rogue officers that the dead body of Mathew
could lie unnoticed in a barrack right in the camp, just across 18 feet road,
when the entire Cantonment is supposed to be under highest alert and
surviallence when recently such barracks were used by terrorists to mount
attacks in Pathankot, triggering a response of surgical strike by army.
I am submitting all these materials in attachment and demand a case to be
registered and investigations carried out against the rogue army officers,
including Col Anil Jethani, for a possible murder dressed as suicide or
forcing Mathew to commit suicide by causing his harassment and installing
false fear of court martial in his mind.
In view of facts and circumstances mentioned above the Official
Establishment at Deolali Cantonment under the influence of the rogue
officers is trying to save Colonel Anil Jethania, immediate superior of
Gunner Roy Mathew.

It is therefore kindly requested that the complaint be registered againt

Colonel Anil Jethania and his collaborators under appropriate provisions of
law and necessary action be taken as reported.

Kindly register an online FIR as required by Maharashtra government and

provide to the Complainant a copy of her complaint as duly registered by
you on email/Whatsapp as required by Maharashtra government.
Complainants mobile no. and email address is already available with you
on which you have been communicating with her.

Applicant/Complainant

Poonam Agarwal
Associate Editor
The Quint