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Failure to identify escorts ruffles Bombay High Court

How can the police not recognise their own men when they are escorting undertrials to court?

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How can the police not recognise their own men when they are escorting undertrials to court?

The Bombay High Court was irked by the fact that the state government and police were unable to identify escorting constables in three separate incidents where undertrials were handcuffed.

As per the Supreme Court guidelines, it is illegal to handcuff undertrials, except in cases where special permission has been taken from the magistrate concerned.

On Wednesday, a division bench of justice SA Bobade and justice Mridula Bhatkar was informed that the senior police inspector of Andheri police station was unable to identify the constable, who escorted a handcuffed undertrial to a magistrate’s court.

“This is too much. We find it difficult to believe. He [senior police inspector] does not recognise the people he works with? You don’t recognise your own man,” asked justice Bobade.

The bench directed the Andheri police officers to file an affidavit to the effect stating that they are unable to identify their constable.

The HC was hearing a public interest litigation filed by NGO Criminal Justice Initiative against unwarranted handcuffing of undertrials while being escorted from jail to courts for hearing. 

With regard to a prisoner who was handcuffed from Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus to Churchgate, the commissioner of police has categorically said that the constable was not from the Mumbai force because he was wearing a red and black band. Mumbai police constables wear yellow and black bands, said public prosecutor Pandurang Pol.

To this Justice Bobade said: “We assume nobody unauthorised will take a prisoner...”

When the court was informed that the police were still investigating the incident where three college students, who were undertrials at Nashik, wrote an examination with their ankles fettered to the desk, justice Bobade asked: “You are still conducting investigations? Just look up your records.”

The HC kept the PIL for hearing after two weeks.

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