Court pulls up police

By Shariff Ameeruddin Ishaqui
Hyderabad, May 28: The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Wednesday pulled up the police while dealing with two separate habeas corpus petitions pertaining to a missing minor girl and a fourth-year student of physiotherapy.
A division bench, comprising Justices L. Narasimha Reddy and Ramesh Ranganathan, found fault with the wording in the counter-affidavit filed by the sub inspector of the Tirupati West police station that the girl’s father did not approach the court with “clean hands” to rescue the girl.
“How can the officer behave with such audacity? What did he mean by stating that the girl’s father did not approach the court with “clean hands”. Can you imagine the anxiety of parents when their children do not return home,” the court told the assistant government pleader, Ms Mohana Reddy.
Ms Mohana Reddy said the girl’s father made a representation to the police after his daughter filed a complaint in Lok Adalat in Kadapa on May 17.
The girl informed the Lok Adalat that she married Amruth Raj, a fourth-year physiotherapy student in her college on April 30. The girl’s father, Mr Y.R. Subrahamanyam, filed a petition on May 21 asking the police to hand his daughter over to him, alleging that she was in the illegal custody of Amruth Raj.
In another case, the court directed the sub inspector of Vikarabad police station to appear on Thursday. Ms Ch. Balamani filed a petition that her 14-year-old daughter was kidnapped by one K. Charles in March. The court expressed its dissatisfaction on the investigation of the case.