HC directs TN Govt to promote ACP indicted by SHRC

Madras High Court today directed Tamil Nadu Government to include the name of an Assistant Commissioner of Police, who had been indicted by State Human Rights Commission in a matter related to a jewellery theft case, in the list of 98 DSPs prepared for promotion as Additional SPs.
Allowing a petition by ACP (Law & Order) Madurai, J Duraisamy, Justice S Nagamuthu of Madurai Bench of the court directed the Home Secretary (Police II) to promote him as Addtional Superintendent of Police (ASP) within eight weeks.
The Petitioner submitted that the SHRC took suo motu cognisance of an incident in 2004 in which a jeweller was found to have been forced to give a false statement relating to theft of jewels when he was Inspector in Tiruvannamalai.

The SHRC had then directed the Police to pay compensation of Rs 10 lakh to the jeweller for forcing him to say that no theft took place. The government recovered Rs 3.5 lakh from Duraisamy's salary and recovered remaining amount from other jurisdictional police officials.
Duraisamy was promoted as DSP belatedly. Now in the list of 98 DSPs who are to be promoted as ADSPs, his name had not been included, though names of seven persons junior to him figure.
The petitioner said neither any departmental proceeding was pending against him now nor any charge sheet laid before any court of law.

He also pointed out that the SHRC charged not only him but A Pari, an IPS officer, and M Ramakrishnan, a DSP, and they were also asked to pay compensation. However, those two officials did not face any difficulty in getting promotion.
The Judge agreed with the contention of the Petitioner and ordered that his name be included in the promotion panel immediately.