The Bombay high court on Tuesday reprimanded the state government in a custodial death case in which the police had said six eyewitnesses were missing.
The Bombay high court on Tuesday reprimanded the state government in a custodial death case in which the police had said six eyewitnesses were missing.
The high court warned the state government that if the police failed to ascertain the eyewitnesses’ whereabouts within two weeks, it would direct the state DGP to initiate an inquiry into the matter and file a report in court.
A division bench of Justice Abhay Oka and Justice A.A. Sayed were hearing petition against Thane Central Jail officials. The petitioner, N.R. Soni, stated in the petition that in 1997, when he was in Thane prison, other inmates and he saw one Robert Almeida being bitten to death by the Thane prison police.
Soni and six other prisoners had narrated the incident to the magistrate when they were produced for personal cases. The magistrate then enquired about the incident but found nothing. However, Soni moved the Bombay high court against the officers.
On Tuesday, the state government said the police had filed a closure report in the matter and the concerned magistrate had accepted it. Usually, the police didn’t keep the records of cases where a C Summary report had been filed.
After perusing the records, the high court found that police had never filed a C Summary report.
The court also pointed out that a home department affidavit had stated that a judicial inquiry must be initiated in this matter, which meant that the state government was not satisfied with the report that the police had submitted to the department.
“How can six witnesses go missing suddenly You must find out if they are missing, then there must be missing persons complaints registered somewhere,” said Justice Oka.
Public prosecutor Mankunwar Deshmukh then said that the missing inmates might have been released on bail. To this, Justice Oka said that if they were indeed released on bail, there must be a record available with the prison authority. The court has kept the matter for hearing on August 9.
