It took a while for Indians to learn how a father and son died in hospital with blood pouring from their rectum, days after police in small southern town locked them up for violating a nationwide coronavirus lockdown.

Residents gather on June 26as they carry the coffin of Jayaraj, 58, and son Bennicks Immanuel, 31, allegedly tortured at the hands of police in Sathankulam, Thoothukudi district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Photo: AFP

Fanned by media reports, outrage spread throughout India over what happened between June 19 and June 23 in Sathankulam, a town on the sub-continent's southern tip, 2,785 kilometers from the capital New Delhi.

A month earlier, many Indians noted how commonplace police brutality was in their own country when they saw the furious global reaction to images of George Floyd, a black American man, dying as a Milwaukee policeman knelt on his neck.

Yet, despite nearly 800 custodial deaths in India in the latest eight years covered by official data, no police officers were convicted in any of the cases.

Charges have yet to be laid in Sathankulam, and it is uncertain whether investigations into the deaths of J Jayaraj, 59, and his son, 31-year-old Bennicks Immanuel will lead to prosecutions, but five officers have been named as murder suspects. Jayaraj, the owner of a mobile phone shop, was detained on June 19 after exchanging words with officers who accused him of breaking lockdown rules.

That night, accompanied by friends, including two lawyers, Immanuel went to the police station looking for his father.

When he remonstrated with police officers over why his father had been beaten, he was locked up too, his friends told Reuters.

Both men, allegedly, were brutally beaten while in custody, taken to hospital, and then transferred to jail.

"When they sat on a chair in the hospital and in a car when they were taken to the magistrate, they left blood trails. That's how much they were bleeding," said S. Rajaram, one of lawyers. Other witnesses asked for their names to be withheld, fearing police retribution.

Immanuel, described as fit and healthy by his family, died on June 22. His father died on June 23. They were buried together a day later.

Jayaraj's eldest daughter recounted what male relatives and friends had told her and photographs had shown.

"You should see the bedsheet they were sitting on while being transported to the jail. It was full of blood. And this was hours after they were brought to a hospital," J Persis, the daughter, told Reuters.

The case prompted popular news channels Times Now and Republic TV to run prime time debates on police conduct.