The High Court of Karnataka has ruled that no person, whether he be an accused, under trial prisoner or convict, should be handcuffed unless the reason for the same is recorded in the case diary and/or the relevant record as to why such a person is required to be handcuffed.
The Dharwad bench of the High Court awarded Rs 2 lakh compensation to the petitioner Suprit Ishwar Divate from Chikkodi who was handcuffed by the police while executing a non-bailable warrant in a cheque bounce case.
The petitioner, a law student, claimed that he was handcuffed and paraded in Ankali town in November 2019 and later taken in a KSRTC bus from Ankali police station to Chikkodi police station without producing before the court. The petitioner said the incident was video recorded and also submitted a CD before the court seeking a compensation of Rs 25 lakh for the loss of reputation, illegal detention and illegal handcuffing.
Justice Suraj Govindaraj noted that the petitioner’s arrest was proper as it was based on a non-bailable warrant. However, on the incident of handcuffing, the court directed the state government to pay the compensation within six weeks with liberty to recover it from the delinquent officers.
The bench said that whenever an accused is produced before a court upon an arrest, it would be the duty of the court to enquire if the accused had been handcuffed or not. "If the person were to respond in the affirmative, the court would have to ascertain the reasons for such handcuffing and to decide on the validity or otherwise of such handcuffing," Justice Govindaraj said.
The bench said the trial Courts shall endeavor, as far as possible, to avoid physical appearance of the under trial prisoners and permit the appearance through video conferencing.
“As far as possible, permission to handcuff an under-trial prisoner would have to be taken prior to the production of the under trial prisoner before the Court and obtain an order for handcuffing from the said Court. If no such permission is applied for and under trial prisoner were to be handcuffed, the concerned police officer would be taking a risk of such handcuffing being declared illegal and action being taken against them,” the court said.
Body cameras for cops
The court has also directed the state DGP and IGP to make available body cameras to all the police officers entitled to arrest a person, so that the manner of arrest is recorded by such body cameras.
“The camera shall also be equipped with microphone to record the conversations that take place at that particular point of time. The video recording as also audio recording shall be retained at least for a period of one year from the date of recording,” Justice Suraj Govindaraj said.