CUTTACK: The Orissa High Court on Tuesday decided to consider a decade-old petition through which the petitioner has sought Rs 20 lakh compensation for false imprisonment of more than two years. In a move to provide restorative justice, the division bench of Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice AK Mohapatra directed the Home Secretary to file a detailed reply to the petition within four weeks and fixed January 19 for a hearing on the matter.
Lawyer Pratima Das, a resident of Choudwar was arrested for her alleged links with the Maoists in Odisha and was in jail from August 13, 2008, until her acquittal on November 17, 2010. In her petition, Pratima has also sought legal action against the police officials responsible for creating false evidence to implicate her in two cases. The petition was filed on November 16, 2011.
On July 22, the Court had issued a fresh notice to the State government and directed for the listing of the case on November 16 after it found that the petition was listed only twice in nine years and eight months and the service of notice had also not been completed.
As additional government advocate Janmejaya Katikia, who appeared for the Secretary of Home department when the matter was taken up on Tuesday, started with oral submissions, the bench wanted an affidavit with a para wise reply to the petition which sought compensation for the alleged failure of the State to protect her life, liberty and livelihood.
According to the petition, the lawyer was arrested by the police on August 12, 2008, and implicated in a criminal case registered with the Raghunathpur police station in Jagatsinghpur district. Charged with sedition, she was remanded to jail custody by the court of the sub-divisional judicial magistrate the next day. While the lawyer was in Alipingal jail, police implicated her in another criminal case registered with the Jamankira police station in Sambalpur district.
In both cases, she faced trial while in jail custody at Alipingala and subsequently at Kuchinda for over a period of two years until she was acquitted of the charges. In both cases, the prosecution could not prove her involvement in any of the alleged offences and she was acquitted, said the petitioner’s advocate PK Jena.