Mumbai: Raising concern in a case where a man sought direction to his wife, an Uzbekistan national, to produce their one-month-old daughter, Bombay High Court observed that the casual manner in which the case diary was maintained by the police was in utter definace of law and directed the Maharashtra DGP to adopt stringent remedial measures.
The man, in his plea, claimed that his wife and her parents went absconding with his infant daughter.On HC vacation bench’s order last December, police had located the woman, her parents and the baby to northern India. The wife and one other person were arrested, but later released on bail. The wife’s lawyer said their arrest flouted the law as they were not first served a section 41A CrPC notice where the police need to first issue a notice to the accused person directing him or her to appear to give a statement when the offence is punishable with less than seven years. After recording the statement, if the police deem it fit, then the arrest should be made.
While asking the DGP to personally look into the case, HC also ordered to adopt necessary legal action against a police officer in Mumbai for failure to maintain a case diary and serve a notice on accused before arrest, as legally required. HC called on the investigating officer (IO) to produce records. When additional public prosecutor Ashwini Takalkar submitted the file, HC was “perplexed” on perusing it. It noted that the case diary was maintained in “utter defiance” of section 172(1-B) of the CrPC, which stated that the diary containing the day-to-day entry of the proceedings in the probe has to be duly paginated. The IO showed “disrespect” and also flouted the DGP’s directions, said the HC. “It appears that the directions issued by the DGP have not been percolated to the lower rank of the police officers, who are conducting investigations at ground level…” The HC said it was “at pains” to issue such directions, but it was regularly coming across such violations. “We expect the DGP to imbibe upon all the police officers the seriousness in following the directions issued by the highest police authority in the state and to not take such directions lightly and/or casually,” said the court.
The directions have been issued to follow and not to violate as per the whims of the IO, the court said, adding that it expects the DGP to adopt remedial measures.
The man, in his plea, claimed that his wife and her parents went absconding with his infant daughter.On HC vacation bench’s order last December, police had located the woman, her parents and the baby to northern India. The wife and one other person were arrested, but later released on bail. The wife’s lawyer said their arrest flouted the law as they were not first served a section 41A CrPC notice where the police need to first issue a notice to the accused person directing him or her to appear to give a statement when the offence is punishable with less than seven years. After recording the statement, if the police deem it fit, then the arrest should be made.
While asking the DGP to personally look into the case, HC also ordered to adopt necessary legal action against a police officer in Mumbai for failure to maintain a case diary and serve a notice on accused before arrest, as legally required. HC called on the investigating officer (IO) to produce records. When additional public prosecutor Ashwini Takalkar submitted the file, HC was “perplexed” on perusing it. It noted that the case diary was maintained in “utter defiance” of section 172(1-B) of the CrPC, which stated that the diary containing the day-to-day entry of the proceedings in the probe has to be duly paginated. The IO showed “disrespect” and also flouted the DGP’s directions, said the HC. “It appears that the directions issued by the DGP have not been percolated to the lower rank of the police officers, who are conducting investigations at ground level…” The HC said it was “at pains” to issue such directions, but it was regularly coming across such violations. “We expect the DGP to imbibe upon all the police officers the seriousness in following the directions issued by the highest police authority in the state and to not take such directions lightly and/or casually,” said the court.
The directions have been issued to follow and not to violate as per the whims of the IO, the court said, adding that it expects the DGP to adopt remedial measures.