'Utter Mockery': Allahabad High Court Pulls Up DGP Over Man Missing From Police Custody Since 2018; Says 'If Eliminated, SP Can't Be Spared'

In a scathing indictment of the Uttar Pradesh Police, the Allahabad High Court has termed the disappearance of a man from police custody since 2018 as nothing short of an "utter mockery" of the justice system. A bench of Justice JJ Munir and Justice Sanjiv Kumar issued a stern warning to the state DGP saying that if the detenue/corpus has been 'eliminated', the responsibility cannot be merely pinned on a junior officer and in such scenario, the then Superintendent of Police (SP) "cannot be spared". These observations were made during the hearing of a Habeas Corpus plea filed in 2018 by the father of Shiv Kumar (detenue), a young man who was allegedly picked up by the police in September 2018 in connection with an abduction case and has not been seen since. According to the petition, his father visited the police station and was assured by the Inspector that his son would be released once the girl's statement was recorded. However, while the girl appeared before the magistrate and denied abduction and stated that she had left her home voluntarily, the corpus never returned home. On November 25, the Court expressed displeasure over the timeline of the case as it noted that the HC order-sheet, containing a total of 22 orders, "reads like a book" of police evasion. For seven years, the police claimed that the detenue is 'untraceable' and also suggested that he might have fled to Nepal. However, rejecting these claims, the High Court observed that the police have been "hoodwinking this Court into not producing the detenue". The bench noted that the effort of the police to trace the detenue is still said to be on which made it nothing but "utter mockery". "Mockery, we say, because a man, who was detained at the police station in connection with a crime way back in the year 2018, is still missing in the year 2025. By now, it is a period of seven years since the detenue disappeared without trace whilst in police custody. This kind of disappearance from police custody cannot be tolerated", the Court remarked. The Court also took serious objection to the long delay in registering an FIR regarding his disappearance. In fact, it was only after the HC's intervention in March 2021, nearly three years after the alleged incident, that an FIR was lodged against an SI and other police personnel for kidnapping and criminal conspiracy (Sections 364 and 120-B IPC). Taking into account the poor progress in the case, the bench had directed the DGP to file an affidavit in this case. HC had remarked thus: "We are informed that the Director General of Police, Lucknow, who currently holds office, is very sensitive about the criticism of his officers. Let him look into the facts of this case and file his own affidavit within three days, before some further and suitable orders are passed in the matter". Pursuant to this, on November 28, the Director General of Police (DGP), Rajeev Krishna, filed a personal affidavit and informed the Court that a Special Investigation Team (SIT) had been constituted under the Additional Director General of Police (Gorakhpur Zone) to find the corpus and ensure action against delinquent officers. However, the Bench remained 'utterly unimpressed' by this late response as it noted that the "eight-year-old rule nisi" (the order to show cause) was still "floating anchorless". However, the bench granted a strict deadline of ten days to trace the detenue and clarified that there were no other alternatives left for the police. The Bench added that the rule nisi could only be answered by "producing the detenue or producing evidence that he is no more in the mortal world or left the country". The Court firmly stated: "There is no fourth way or option." The matter is now listed for December 9.

'Utter Mockery': Allahabad High Court Pulls Up DGP Over Man Missing From Police Custody Since 2018; Says 'If Eliminated, SP Can't Be Spared'

Sparsh Upadhyay

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