Delhi Police Commissioner S N Shrivastava on Tuesday defended the arrest of activist Disha Ravi in the toolkit case, saying the action was taken as per law and it "does not differentiate between a 22-year-old or a 50-year-old".
Shrivastava's remarks came even as activists and lawyers questioned why a transit remand was not obtained from a court in Bengaluru where Disha was arrested.
"As far as Disha's arrest is concerned, it was done as per the procedures. Law doesn't differentiate between a 22-year-old and a 50-year-old," he told reporters.
He said she was produced before a court on Sunday which sent her to five-day police custody for interrogation. "It is false when people say that there were lapses in the arrest," he added.
Disha along with Mumbai lawyer Nikita Jacob and Pune-based engineer Shantanu has been accused of creating the toolkit on farmers' protest and shared it with others to tarnish India's image.
On Monday, Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber Cell) Prem Nath also defended the action, saying that Disha was arrested in the presence of her mother in her residence in Bengaluru and the local Station House Officer. He had claimed all procedures were followed.
However, lawyers and activists claimed that Delhi Police has violated the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs on 'Arrest of an Accused Outside the State/UT jurisdiction' and the Criminal Procedure Code. A group of lawyers also filed a complaint with Bengaluru police claiming that the MHA's 2012 guidelines were violated.
The guideline was issued on May 16, 2012, after it came to notice that police officers carrying out an arrest in another state, bring back the arrested person and produce him before the magistrate in their own jurisdiction. "However, this procedure is not in accordance with the law," it had added.
The Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms (CJAR) on Monday said that Disha should have been first produced before a competent court in Bengaluru for obtaining transit remand since she was being moved between states, but was not.
She was instead produced before the Duty Magistrate in Delhi, who is “by no means the nearest magistrate as required by clause (2) of Article 22”, it said adding Delhi Police have failed to follow any of the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court.