CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has mauled the Tamil Nadu Police Department for shoddy investigation of motor vehicle accident cases and failure to comply with the procedures for filing the charge sheet within the stipulated time.
Taking serious views on the lapses in the investigation and failure to file a charge sheet in a criminal court regarding a fatal road accident, a division bench of Justices R Subramanian and N Senthilkumar recently directed the Police department to ensure that the final reports (charge sheets) are filed within the time contemplated under section 468 of CrPC, 1973 and issue appropriate circular to all the investigating officers stressing the need for filing the final reports on time.
The bench also directed the Department to take action against those failing to file the charge sheets on time.
“The Police department shall ensure that appropriate disciplinary action is taken in cases where there is a failure on the part of the officer to comply with the provisions of section 173 (2) (i) within the time limit stipulated under Section 468 of CrPC.”
The direction was given while dismissing an appeal filed by the children of a victim, K Arulappan who died in an accident outside the Madhavaram milk plant in 2009, challenging an order of dismissal of their motor vehicle accident claim petition by a tribunal stating that the vehicle shown to have caused the accidents, in which their father was killed, proved to be planted by the police to facilitate the claim.
They filed the petition seeking Rs. 27 lakh compensation. However, the investigating police had not filed the charge sheet in the criminal court regarding the case.
The bench expressed concern over the lack of proper investigation into the road accidents and noted that wrong vehicles are booked due to shoddy probes. “We find, in the recent past, there is a considerable spike in the number of cases where vehicles are planted in accidents by the Police in connivance with the victims of road accidents.”
Pointing out that due to “terribly low” compensation provided by the state for hit-and-run accident victims, vehicles that are not involved in the accident are booked to claim better compensation, the bench wanted the state government to “have a re-look into the scheme for payment of compensation for victims” of hit-and-run accidents.
The court further directed the DGP to ensure the filing of charge sheets within the stipulated time and noted that the court has enabled the online filing of charge sheets.