Karnataka High Court Orders Post-Morterm Of Migrant Labourer Who Died In Police Encounter After Being Accused Of Killing 5-Yr-Old Girl

The Karnataka High Court today (April 15) directed the State government to conduct a post-mortem of the body a migrant labourer from Bihar, who was allegedly killed in a police encounter on April 13 at Hubballi. 

The deceased, Ritesh Kumar, was accused of killing a 5-year-old girl in Huballi. On April 13, he was shot by the police. As per the police, the accused was shot after he was trying to flee from them. 

A division bench of Chief Justice N V Anjaria and Jutice K V Aravind directed the State government to follow the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court in PUCL V. State of Maharashtra (2014) in cases of death caused by police actions. 

The Court said that the deceased's body should be subjected to post-mortem by two doctors at a local hospital. It noted “The body of the accused shall be subjected to post mortem by a team of two doctors at the local hospital as per direction of the Supreme Court. Videography be undertaken for the entire duration of the postmortem and authorities shall preserve samples of the parts of the body collected during the post mortem, to be made available for investigation if required.”

The directions were given while issuing notice to the respondent authorities returnable on April 24, on a petition filed by the People's Union for Civil Liberties, Karnataka. 

Senior Advocate Aditya Sondhi appearing for PUCL/petitioner apprised the Court about details of the crime against the deceased and the details about the alleged encounter and said, “At the moment we are not entering into adversarial acquisitions against the state. I am only pointing to the mandatory guidelines to be followed.” 

Pressing for interim relief he said “ We have learnt that cremation of the deceased is likely to take place today. At this stage I am only requesting the body of the deceased be preserved."

Advocate General Shashi Kiran Shetty appearing for the State said “We have already registered an FIR, CID is investigating the case. There is no question of cremation. In such incidents there is no cremation but a burial and we are strictly following the SC order.” He said that if the body is to be released to the family, it will only be allowed for burial after identification. He submitted that cremation will not be permitted under any circumstances, so that body can be exhumed at a later point of time as may be required in the course of the investigation.

Taking note of the Advocate General's submission that the body would not be cremated, the bench said “Having noted this submission, it is to be observed that apprehension of the petitioner that the body would be cremated is not well placed.”

Case Title: People's Union for Civil Liberties AND State of Karnataka