Sexual assault case on daughter by father: K’taka HC directs police to appoint new probe officer

Bengaluru, July 14 The Karnataka High Court has rapped police for not appropriately investigating a case of sexual assault on a girl by her father, and directed the Bengaluru Police Commissioner to appoint a new investigating officer.

The bench headed by Justice M. Nagaprasanna gave the order on Thursday while looking into the petition submitted by the mother of the victim seeking direction for additional investigation into the matter. Considering the plea and after observing the lacuna in the charge sheet submitted by the Koramangala police in Bengaluru, the bench gave directions for the appointment of a new investigating officer.

The bench gave directions that the newly appointed investigating officer should conduct additional investigation and submit a charge sheet to the court in 10 weeks. Until then, the lower court, which is looking into the matter, should not take any decision considering the charge sheet submitted by the police already in the case. The court can only take the matter further after the submission of the latest charge sheet, the bench stated.

The couple got married in 2014 and they had a daughter later. The wife had lodged a complaint with Koramangala police station on August 24 against her husband. She alleged that her husband used to take off the clothes of their four-year-old daughter and used to touch her inappropriately while giving her a bath.

She further alleged that her husband forced to have sex in front of the kid. He uploaded porn videos in the I-Pad used by the child and forced her to watch them.

The police had lodged a POCSO case against the husband and submitted a charge sheet in October, 2020 to the local court. The mother had objected to it and claimed that the charge sheet had drawbacks. However, the trial court had quashed her petition. The mother had filed an appeal petition in the High Court.

The court observed that the charge sheet submitted by the police showed they have not gathered documents needed for investigation. The investigating officers had intentionally refused to collect the documents and the investigation was improper, the bench stated.

The victim had taken the name of the accused in the statement and this has not been included in the charge sheet. The statement of the victim before the doctors is also not shown. The police have not inquired about the victim's mother and recorded her statement. The phones and laptop, which contained porn videos, were taken into custody and there was no reference of them in the charge sheet, the bench observed.

The police have also not got the statement of relatives regarding the psychotic behaviour of the accused. The statement of psychologists regarding the suffering of the child was also not included in the charge sheet. Intentionally, the charges were framed against the accused. The report by the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) regarding the I-Pad was not made available and in spite of all this, a charge sheet had been submitted, the court said