BENGALURU: “I will clean the road in front of my police station for a week,” a police station house officer has undertaken before the high court’s Kalaburagi bench.
This was after the court took the SHO of Station Bazaar police station in Kalaburagi city to task for his failure to register a complaint by a woman whose son had been abducted.
A division bench comprising justices S Sunil Dutt Yadav and P Krishna Bhat recorded his undertaking and disposed of the December 17 habeas corpus petition filed by Tarabai after her son Suresh was produced before the court.
A resident of Minajgi tanda in the district, Tarabai had earlier approached police with a complaint of abduction, stating that Suresh has been missing since October 20.
“The entire development in the case after Suresh went missing discloses a very disturbing facet of the functioning of police stations in this area of the state. The problem, primarily, is one of police officers not complying with the provisions prescribed under the Code of Criminal Procedure, which places a high premium on the guarantee of liberty of individuals,” the bench observed.
The judges noted that when Tarabai approached the SHO, he was quite conscious that what was conveyed to him constituted a cognisable offence and therefore, he was obliged to make an entry in the station house diary and register an FIR.
“If the facts disclosed to him amounted to an offence taking place within the limits of his police station, then he should have proceeded with investigation of the case, and if the offence disclosed took place outside his jurisdiction, then he was obliged to transfer the FIR to the jurisdictional police station for further investigation. In spite of the same, he has overlooked the mandate of law in as much as he has not made an entry in the station house diary nor has he registered an FIR, which has resulted in stultifying the precious right of the petitioner and her son Suresh,” the bench noted.
Considering these lapses, the government advocate submitted that the officer would submit an undertaking to do community service for atoning his conduct and the court should take a lenient view. Accepting the same, the bench permitted the officer to file an undertaking in which he not only tendered unconditional apology, but also said he would be cleaning the road in front of his police station for one week.
The court directed the Kalaburagi superintendent of police to hold a workshop/ orientation course for all officers in the district on the subject of “zero FIR” .