New Delhi: An investigating officer did not appear before a special court for the last 12 years leading to the Madhya Pradesh high court to say that it was “nothing but insensitivity on the part of the police department,” Indian Express has reported.
The court has fined the state government Rs 1 lakh and instructed the Director General of Police to investigate the issue.
Investigating officer Virendra Kumar Mishra, although posted as superintendent of police at Daita, failed to appear in a case relating to an alleged fake encounter, delaying the process of the court considering the case’s closure report.
The case had its roots in 2005 – nearly 20 years ago. One Vimla Devi had alleged that cops from the Dabra police station took her three sons to the police station on April 22. Two were released but a third had been kept in police custody. Khushali Ram eventually died. But Vimla, who learnt of his death from the newspaper, maintained that police had falsely represented him as a gangster “Kalia alias Brijkishore”.
Two years later, in 2007, this very Kalia was found alive in a jail at Jhansi.
Vimla accused the Datia superintendent of police M.K. Mudgal and others of killing her son.
The high court noted that a final closure report could not be considered by the special court, in the meantime, because of IO Mishra’s inability to appear before the special court since 2012.
The trial court in MP had earlier directed the state to pay Vimla Rs 20,000 for inaction over her son’s death in 2007. This amount, the high court noted, has not been paid to her till date.
“Most of the time, he remained on deputation but did not care to appear before the special court so that the learned session court could examine the closure report,” the court said.
The unending process of justice in India is a matter frequently highlighted in studies of criminal law. It is often said that it makes the process of seeking justice from court a punishment, with pretrial detainees waiting for decades for their cases to start and some disputes lasting three or four decades.
