Shelter home
Court indicates CBI may get charge of probe
NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday came down heavily on the Bihar government for diluting criminal cases against shelter homes where sexual violence and brutal physical assault were reported earlier this year.
Shocked at the apathy with which the state police filed cases, a three-judge bench led by justice MB Lokur indicated that it might transfer the cases to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
“Only God can save (the children),” the bench said after it perused a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Patna-based journalist Nivedita Jha claiming the police were selective and soft on the perpetrators.
“Every time I read this file, I am hit by the tragedy of this case. It’s tragic,” said justice Deepak Gupta, another member of the bench. The court asked the CBI counsel to seek instructions on its proposal to let the agency take over all the cases.
The Muzaffarpur shelter home abuse case that hit the headlines in July this year was only one of 15 shelter homes indicted in the study by Mumbai-based Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS). The Muzaffarpur case is now under the CBI, which has already arrested the head of the home, Brajesh Thakur.
On directions from the top court, Thakur has been moved out of Patna to a jail in Rajasthan.
According to Jha’s counsel, senior advocate Shekhar Naphade and lawyer Fauzia Shakil, of the remaining 14 shelter homes, the police have registered cases against just 10.
This too, they argued, has not been done under aggravated offences but under sections with lower punishment. The lawyers referred to the TISS report and submitted a chart to the bench, indicating the “lackadaisical” manner in which the police were dealing with the cases.
In one instance, it was pointed out, that though TISS found sexual violence at a shelter home for boys, the First Information Report (FIR) did not include the stringent penal code provisions, which is sodomy. The case been registered under POCSO – special law meant to deal with sexual offences against children – and that too under a lesser offence.
“What are you (Bihar government) doing? It’s shameful. If the child is sodomised, you say it’s nothing? How can you do this? It’s inhuman. We were told that matter will be looked with great seriousness, this is seriousness?” justice Lokur said. Questions were posed to the state chief secretary who could not respond.
“Is this of any sense Mr Chief Secretary? A child is sodomised and you do not arrest the person who has done it,” justice Lokur asked the senior bureaucrat.
Justice Gupta added: “The report also speaks of financial irregularities, but the FIR doesn’t mention it. It’s strange because normally an FIR is registered under graver offences. But here all are under lesser sections.”
The CBI counsel told the court that the agency would be more than willing to take up the matter for “human cause.”