Video footage released by Delhi Police on Sunday showed Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke being informed of his grandmother's death while held in custody, a disclosure the force put forward in response to claims from his family and party that the news had been withheld and that he had been barred from attending the funeral.
Officers informed Dipke of the news and made assistance available to him for reaching his family and arranging a journey back to his home district in Maharashtra. The footage was published at a time when questions had been raised about the conditions of his detention, with his family also contending that authorities had not taken steps to enable him to be brought home before the funeral.
Delhi Police stated that officers on multiple occasions asked Dipke whether he wished to contact his parents, and that assistance with the journey back home was made available to him throughout. Audio from the footage captured an officer asking him about his preferred travel method — whether by air, rail, road coach, or some other means. When an officer offered to facilitate a conversation between Dipke and his father, Dipke indicated that such a conversation would not be possible for him at that time.
Police were notified of the bereavement and passed word to Dipke about both his grandmother's passing and the time set for her funeral, according to Deputy Commissioner Neha Yadav, who holds the force's public relations portfolio. Officers, she stated, put forward every available form of support to help him travel on humanitarian grounds, and he did not take up the offer.
A statement put out by the police addressed assertions from Dipke's family and the CJP about how his detention had been managed. Anita Dipke raised a formal complaint alleging that Delhi Police had provided false accounts of whether her son was notified about his grandmother's passing. She told reporters that the family had lost all contact with him, and that appeals for his return had gone without any response. Relatives had indicated that the funeral proceedings were being held back, with Dipke's arrival home still awaited.
Savitribai Shankarrao Dipke, his grandmother, died on Saturday in Maharashtra's Hingoli district at the age of 85, following a prolonged illness. A funeral service for her took place on Sunday morning.
The CJP raised doubts about the version of events put forward by police. Speaking at a press conference, party leader Ashutosh Ranka alleged that Dipke learned of the death through a process he characterised as devoid of compassion — one that unfolded with recording equipment and a microphone already set up and running. According to that account, Dipke made repeated requests to contact his cousin by phone, citing his parents' status as heart patients, yet permission for those calls was withheld.
The custody footage and the account put forward by Dipke's family presented two different versions of the support and communication he received during that time.
A statement from Delhi Police also addressed the grounds for withholding authorisation for the Citizens for Justice and Peace's planned demonstration at Jantar Mantar, which had been directed at Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. According to Yadav, the party had breached conditions attached to an earlier protest authorisation and had not honoured undertakings and directives given on previous occasions. Procedural requirements, along with the broader state of security and public order, formed part of the grounds put forward by police.
Three individuals — Dipke, along with CJP co-conveners Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das — were taken into custody by authorities aboard an aircraft at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport on Saturday, shortly after the flight touched down. Party leaders who had travelled from Mumbai had gathered ahead of a rally calling for Kumar's removal from office, citing what they described as irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process for electoral rolls.
All three individuals were detained on a preventive basis, with Sections 126 and 170 of the BNSS cited as the legal grounds. A Special Executive Magistrate court at Delhi Cantonment heard the matter on Sunday, after which the group was released. Each of the leaders was placed under an obligation to keep the peace and conduct themselves accordingly for twelve months, backed by a surety bond set at Rs 50,000.
