MOHAMMED HUSSAIN Vs. DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT OF POLICE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner has filed this writ petition complaining that at the behest of respondents 4 and 5, the 3rd respondent Sub Inspector of Police, Ponkunnam has unduly intervened in a civil dispute which was decided in favour of the petitioner by a competent civil court under Ext. P1 judgment of this Court and by compelling the petitioner to give his endorsement to Ext. P4 statement which was recorded in the petition register maintained in the police station. The action of the 3rd respondent, it is alleged amounts to sheer harassment. On considering this writ petition for admission we directed Sri. M.K. Aboobacker, the learned Senior Government Pleader who took notice on behalf of respondents 1 to 3 to seek instructions from those officers as to the correctness of accusations of police harassment. Sri. M.K. Aboobacker submitted that the complaint was received from respondents 4 and 5 by the 1st respondent. The complaint was to the effect that the petitioner and his mother, the 6th respondent were threatening the petitioner with bodily injury and were trying to dispossess the petitioner forcibly from a property which he was entitled to hold. The petitioners attendance in the police station was solicited only for conducting an enquiry into the complaint. As regards Ext. P4 it was submitted that it is not correct to say that the petitioner was compelled to subscribe his signature to Ext. P4 statement. Ext. P4 statement was willingly given by the petitioner under his signature on his own violation. According to Mr. Aboobacker the action of the 3rd respondent cannot be branded as harassment. He submitted that in the wake of Ext. P1, Ext. P4 statement will not have any value and this Court can observe that Ext. P4 statement is liable to be ignored.

(2.) Sri. K.P. Sreekumar the Learned Counsel for the petitioner would draw our attention to the judgment of this Court in Mathew v. Kuruvilla,1983 KIT 104. He submitted on the basis of the above decision that any intervention by the police in the civil disputes between the parties will have to be treated as unauthorised and illegal. He took a strong exception to Ext. P4 and submitted specifically referring to certain passages in paragraph 13 of the above judgment that Ext. P4 is a document tainted by coercion. According to Mr. Sreekumar coercion can be various forms "whether the target is the mind or the muscle; or the focal point of attack is the body or the nerves, or the form of torture subtle or severe". The Learned Counsel went on to submit that "the atmosphere of the police station, the duration of the detention, the tone and tenor of the threatening language of a police official, and the encircling gloom left behind by a day that was dead, all conjure up to produce a situation of coercion, with torment both to body and to mind." Again referring to paragraph 20 of the same judgment Mr. Sreekumar submitted that it has been clearly delineated in paragraph 87 of the Police Manual under the caption Principles of Police Conduct as follows:

(3.) Mr. Sreekumar requested that we straight away quash Ext. P4. He pointed out that significantly the police have not registered any crime on the basis of the alleged assaults and threats from the part of respondents 4 and 5.