Telangana High Court on Thursday instructed Director General of Police to ensure that lawyer couple P.V. Nagamani and Gattu Vaman Rao were not threatened by any police officer.
A bench of Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy ordered the DGP not to call them to any police station. A lawyer practising at HC, Ms. Nagamani wrote a letter to the Chief Justice earlier stating that a person Sheelam Rangaiah died in the custody of Manthani police station of Ramagundam Police Commissionerate. The HC took up the letters as PIL petition and issued notices to the government. Subsequently, the bench directed Hyderabad Police Commissioner Anjani Kumar to inquire into the alleged custodial death. On this June 19, Mr. Anjani Kumar presented his report to the HC. The report was kept under the custody of HC Registrar General.
Ms. Nagamani was permitted to take notes of the report so that she could file a counter affidavit. The lawyer complained to the HC that the police started harassing her and husband at their native place of Manthani and in Hyderabad since HC permitted her to file the counter affidavit over the inquiry report. She charged that her husband Gattau Vaman Rao, also a lawyer, was implicated in a false case at Basanthnagar police station of Ramagundam commissionerate. She told the court that police department threatened her over phone that her life and lives of her children and husband would be in danger if she filed counter affidavit over Hyderabad Police Commissioner’s report on ‘custodial death’.
Stating that Ms. Nagamani narrated these allegations verbally before the court, the bench directed her to file an affidavit in the court about the charges she had made against the police department. An affidavit by her husband should also be filed, the bench said.
“Such affidavits shall be accompanied by any documentary evidence to substantiate their allegations. The said affidavits should be filed by them by September 11”, the bench order said.
