The division bench of Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice Ajay Kumar Gupta of Calcutta High Court on Tuesday passed an order to suspend the inspector-in-charge and a sub-inspector of Baguiati police station “for dereliction of duty” during an investigation.
They directed Bidhannagar police commissioner to initiate disciplinary proceedings against inspector-in-charge Santanu Sarkar and sub-inspector Biswajit Das.
Das, who was the investigating officer in a case where a minor girl was reportedly kidnapped and subjected to sexual harassment, allegedly left the photograph of the minor in the case diary and submitted it to the court. He had also arrested the accused person who was “exonerated” in the statement of the minor.
The Supreme Court in a judgment said police officers should keep all the documents in which the name of the victim is mentioned in a sealed cover, as far as possible, and replace the documents with identical ones in which the name of the victim is removed in all records which may be scrutinised in the public domain.
The Telegraph spoke to two officers of Bidhannagar police. One said: “Utmost care is taken while handling Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act cases.” The other refused to comment on the order.
The order also mentioned the explanation (for keeping the victim’s photograph in the case diary) submitted by the officers. “In the explanation, it is stated that the victim went missing and a missing diary was registered. Under such circumstances, unintentionally her photograph came to be a part of the case diary which was produced in court.”