Court tells Delhi cops to check rapes

The Delhi High Court Thursday told the police that there is a need to improve its "working mechanism" to curb heinous crimes like gang-rapes.

A division bench Chief Justice N.V. Ramana said Justice Pradeep Nandrajog said that despite their earlier direction to police to ensure safety of women, rapes were being committed.

The court, on its own initiative, took note of the Dec 16, 2012 gang rape of a woman in a moving bus here and issued orders to police.

"The implementation of such directions is the real issue and you need to improve the working mechanism," the bench said.

The court asked Special Public Prosecutor Dayan Krishnan to place on record the shortage of personnel for investigation of cases.

"The Delhi Police will file an affidavit disclosing the number of vacancies of assistant sub-inspectors, sub-inspectors and inspectors and the number of women personnel. The affidavit will also disclose their duties in police stations," the court said.

It asked the central and Delhi governments to file affidavits giving the number of forensic laboratories in the city.

The court would next hear the case Oct 3.