HC raps Punjab cops for 'high-handedness'

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, June 13

Intending to usurp Wakf property in Ferozepur after displaying scant regard for the law, the Punjab Police not only forced five persons to undergo the “agony of facing a criminal case”, but also compelled them to live under “constant fear” by keeping the FIR pending for the last more than six years in a mischievous manner— the Punjab and Haryana High Court has held.

Quashing the cheating and forgery case against them, Justice Vinod S Bhardwaj has now directed the state to pay Rs 50, 000 compensation for harassment and humiliation after holding that the case reflected “gross abuse of authority by the state investigating agency which was reminiscent of a colonial-era where the might of the police would stampede all authority”.

The case against Joginder Pal and other petitioners was registered on November 25, 2016, at city police station in Ferozepur on a complaint by former MLA Ravinder Singh Sandhu (Babbal) and another. The petitioners’ case was that Wakf property, under the SHO’s forcible and unauthorised occupation, was being used as his residence.

Responding to a petition filed in 2001, the state conceded it had encroached upon the land through the Police Department, following which the property’s possession was delivered to the Wakf board and leased out to the petitioners.

Justice Bhardwaj asserted the FIR was registered in 2016 even through the authorities were aware and conscious of the high court order. The petitioners were subjected to undue hardship and arraigned as accused, reflecting “highhandedness”. The FIR registration manner too reflected mischief.

It was registered after more than 15 years without challenging the high court orders/judgments. Even after the FIR’s registration in 2016, the respondents could not point out any document purportedly forged by the petitioners or the Wakf Board.

Justice Bhardwaj observed the petitioners were, inducted as lessees after the property’s possession was handed over by the respondent-department, while acknowledging unauthorised possession. The instrumentality and the agencies of the state were required to display fairness in action and not conduct themselves as encroachers and usurpers of private property by “sheer abuse of brute force”.

Justice Bhardwaj added a novel method was chosen to incarcerate the lessees for entering the premises/land the respondent-Police Department wanted to continue occupying sans any authority of law but “for its perceived entitlement and being over-confidently aware and conscious that as an investigating and prosecuting agency, it cannot be subjected to any further check by other instrumentality of the state”.

Justice Bhardwaj added such a mindset reflecting intent to occupy land, even if it amounted to grabbing without entitlement and penalising anyone owning the property by adopting a procedure unknown to law, was required be deprecated.

Cannot be oppressor of law

• It was incumbent upon the state to have acted expeditiously and conclude the probe in a time-bound manner
• Fairness, transparency, rule of law and primacy of rights of individual were never the Police Department’s concern
• The police as a law enforcement agency could not be oppressor of law and display its status above law.
• A court of law has to stand co-actively to ensure that state instrumentalities did not become a law unto themselves