The Bombay High Court on Tuesday directed the Registrar of HC to issue a circular to all magistrates in the State to conduct an inquiry as soon as they get to know of a custodial death.
A Division Bench of Justice Abhay Oka and Justice A.A. Sayed was hearing a criminal public interest litigation filed by India Centre for Human Rights seeking implementation of provisions of Section 1 A of Section 176 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. The section says an inquiry has to be held by the judicial magistrate and metropolitan magistrate about the death or disappearance of a person or alleged rape in police and judicial custody within 24 hours of the death and forward the body to the nearest civil surgeon or other qualified medical person appointed by the State.
In the last hearing, the court had asked the State to come up with a government resolution for implementation of the Section 176 as the court was informed that only 50 per cent deaths in custody are informed to the magistrates and of which 25 per cent are labelled as natural deaths. The court had then asked the State to file a reply to how many judicial magistrates refuse to conduct an inquiry into a custodial death.
On Tuesday, the court said whether a person dies a natural death or otherwise, it is the mandate of all judicial magistrates’ first class and metropolitan magistrates to conduct their own inquiry as soon as they are intimated of a death in custody. The court thus directed the Registrar of HC to issue a circular to all magistrates to inform them to implement Section 176 of CrPC and to conduct an inquiry to find out the cause of death. On May 5, 2016, the court had said that it is necessary for the State government to issue directions to all the officers of the jail and the officers in charge of the police stations to submit immediate intimation in writing to the judicial magistrates or the metropolitan magistrates about a death in the custody and this has to be done within six weeks.
