Don't treat every case of missing girl as depicted in films: HC

Taking serious note of the police's failure to trace a minor girl who went missing from Thane district last year, the Bombay High Court said it was high time that the police machinery changed its mindset.

In an order passed earlier on July 10, a bench of Justices S C Dharamadhikari and Bharati Dangre said the police authorities must stop assuming that every missing person's case, involving a minor girl, was about her having eloped with a lover, as depicted in films.

"We are most unhappy with the state of affairs and the prevailing mindset of the police... Let not the investigating teams and officials placed at the highest level treat every case as one where the girl child runs away with the boy she loves, particularly as depicted in cinema or a film on the screen," the bench said.

Let the authorities not forget that these are real life events and there are persons who are suffering on account of loss of their children and also, where the children who have gone missing might be suffering too, it said.

"...it is high time that a change is brought about in their mindsets," the court said.

The observations were made while the bench was hearing a writ petition filed earlier this year by the girl's father, seeking that the police be directed to expedite its search for his daughter.

In compliance with the court's previous directions, Additional Public Prosecutor J P Yagnik submitted a report in the court expressing helplessness on part of the police in tracing the girl.

He submitted that as per the probe conducted so far, the minor girl had left home of her own accord after being "enticed" by a senior boy from her school.

The two of them had escaped to Tamil Nadu, and they kept changing their locations, Yagnik told the high court.

He also told the court that the police had recorded the statement of the boy's parents and they were not under any suspicion.

At this, the court asked the police how could they say with such certainty that the boy's parents, his relatives, or friends were not involved?