Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Mar 29: High Court today directed the Inspector General of Police, Kashmir to conduct an enquiry into case filed by a woman in which she has alleged to have been booked falsely for making obscene acts in public.
Justice Dhiraj Singh Thakur said that duty to do justice and to act fairly is not the exclusive domain of judges sitting in courts of law.
“Any person, whose decision affects the rights of the parties or their reputation, has an onerous responsibility to act fairly, especially when entire criminal justice system is invoked against an accused,” High Court said.
The Court was hearing a petition filed by a woman, Dr. Farha Yousuf, in which she has alleged that police had booked her under FIR No.110/2012, under Sections 294/188 RPC (committing obscene acts in public), at Police Station Nigeen along with a man, Altaf Ahmad Wani on September 9, 2012
The Court directed the IGP to conduct an enquiry into the entire matter himself based upon the representation which has already been filed by the petitioner and entire sequence of events shall be gone into by him personally.
“The petitioner shall also be heard in the matter and respondents (IGP) shall submit the enquiry report to this court in a sealed cover by the next date of hearing, which is fixed on May 1, 2014,” the court directed.
The petitioner alleges that she has been framed in the case and she has given details of the events which happened on the date of her arrest, which seriously contradicted the sequence of events that have appeared in the criminal charge.
Additional Advocate General, Riyaz Ahmad Khan, submitted that the petitioner and other accused were, in fact, in a houseboat at Nigeen.
The petitioner alleges that by the act of police, irreparable injury has been caused to the reputation of the petitioner in society and also the petitioner is a popular Stage, TV and Radio anchor.
After hearing counsel for both the parties the court pulled up the police authorities by projecting the contrary story.
“It appears that the state through its police agency has one story for the court dealing with the criminal case and quite another for its law officer before this court,” the court observed.
The court rapped the police authorities and said: “While a police officer has a statutory duty to perform by investigating a cognizable offence, it is no part of his duty to frame a false case against an accused only to ensure his conviction”.
“And it is very easy for a police agency including its top officer to believe that whatever allegations have been leveled in the FIR must be correct but then experience has shown that same might not be true in every case,” the court said.
“It is the onerous responsibility of the superior officers to ensure that their subordinate officers at the helm of affairs investigate the cases fairly and if they ever find that in a particular case it is not done so, admit that mistake and take appropriate action against the concerned officers.”
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