[ad_1]
Guwahati:The Gauhati High Court on Monday stayed some observations made by a lower court last week against Assam police while granting bail to Independent MLA from Gujarat, Jignesh Mevani, in a case of alleged assault of a woman police officer.
The HC made it clear that the stay on the observations “may not be construed in any manner as a stay to the grant of bail” to Mevani by the lower court in connection with the case.
Following Mevani’s bail order on April 29, the Assam government through its home department had filed a petition in the HC seeking a stay on the observations made by Barpeta district and sessions judge Aparesh Chakravarty on the ground that it casts aspersions on the police force and could affect its morale.
In his bail order Chakravarty had stated that the case against the MLA was ‘manufactured’ by Assam police purely with the intention of keeping him in custody for a longer duration “abusing the process of the court and the law”.
“These findings are prima facie beyond the exercise of the jurisdiction of the sessions court in a proceeding under Section 439 (dealing with bail) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Cr.PC) and accordingly the said observation is stayed,” Justice Devashis Baruah stated in his order on Monday.
Mevani, a convener of Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch, who had offered support to Congress last year, had been first arrested on April 20 in Gujarat’s Palanpur and brought to the northeastern state by Assam’s Kokrajhar district police in connection with a FIR filed by a BJP leader for alleged offensive tweets against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He was granted bail by a local court there on April 25, but was rearrested by Barpeta district police for allegedly assaulting and outraging the modesty of a woman police officer while he was being brought from Guwahati to Kokrajhar on April 21 by road. He was sent to 5 days police remand the following day.
Significantly, in his 13-page bail order Chakravarty raised questions about the growing incidents of deaths and injuries of accused persons in Assam following their arrest and alleged attempts to escape from police custody.
“Send a copy of this order to the Registrar General of the Hon’ble Gauhati High Court for placing the same before Hon’ble the Chief Justice to look into this aspect of the matter and to consider whether the matter may be taken up as a PIL to curb the ongoing police excesses in the state,” the bail order issued by Chakravarty for Mevani on Friday, read.
The Barpeta court observed that to “prevent registration of false FIR” the HC could direct Assam Police “to reform itself by taking some measures…to give credibility to police version of occurrences”.
The court held instances of accused persons attempting to escape from police custody at midnight, while the accused was allegedly leading the police personnel to discover something and the police personnel firing and killing or injuring such accused has “become a routine phenomenon in the state”.
It stated that the HC could consider directing the police that every police personnel engaged in law-and-order duty to wear body cameras, to install CCTV cameras in vehicles while arresting an accused or taking an accused to some place for discovery of some articles and also install CCTV cameras inside all police stations.
“Otherwise, our society will become a police state, which the society can ill afford…converting our hard-earned democracy into a police state is simply unthinkable and if the Assam Police is thinking about the same, the same is perverse thinking,” the order read.
Challenging these observations, the Assam government approached the HC seeking a stay on them as they “demoralise the police force” and could “have a cascading effect on the morale of Assam police as well as the state of Assam”.
“These observations were made without there being any materials on record, on the basis of which the learned judge could have made the observations and consequently, this court stays the observations until further orders,” Justice Baruah stated in his order on Monday.
The HC sent notices to Mevani and the woman police officer who had lodged the case against the Gujarat MLA and fixed May 27 as the next date of hearing for the present petition.
“The court agreed to our contention that the observations made by the lower court while granting bail to Mevani were not required. The Assam government will file a separate petition in HC seeking cancellation of the Gujarat MLA’s bail,” said Assam advocate general, Debajit Saikia.
“The HC order staying some observations made by the lower court against Assam police doesn’t have any impact on the bail granted to the Gujarat MLA,” senior advocate Angshuman Bora, who represented Mevani in the lower court, said.
[ad_2]
Source link