BENGALURU: The Karnataka High Court has directed the Director General and Inspector General of Police (DG&IGP) to hold a departmental inquiry against KY Praveen, police inspector attached to Cottonpet Police Station, who is placed under suspension.
Praveen was charged with failure to file a complaint against one M Vinayaka and his followers who allegedly broke open the door of his house and stole several valuables in March 2021.
The high court has given three months time to submit the report. While disposing of the petition filed by M Prakash, Justice M Nagaprasanna said, “The crime was registered five months and 21 days after the magistrate’s direction to register and investigate. Therefore, there has been blatant callousness on the part of the Station House Officer of Cottonpet Police Station, who displayed a lackadaisical attitude towards registration of the crime.”
The petitioner had moved the magistrate’s court by filing a private complaint seeking directions to register his complaint. Accordingly, an order was passed on April 29, 2022, but the complaint was not registered.
The state defended its action by stating that the court’s police constable collected the order of the magistrate on May 4, 2022 and kept the intimation on the table of the inspector Praveen. Due to oversight, the officer lost sight of the case, the state told the court and informed that the chargesheet was filed on January 7, 2023. The court noted that the failure to register the crime by the officer cannot be brushed aside as a mere loss of file and tracing of it.