Context: Recently, the Chief Justice of India expressed his concerns about the human rights violations in police stations. The violations happen despite various constitutional safeguards and guarantees. 

• Unfortunately, the threat to human rights violation & bodily integrity is highest in police stations. Since the police are meant to protect human rights, efforts are needed to improve the situation in the police stations.

Key Findings of National crime Record Bureau

• NCRB data show that on average about 47.2 criminal cases were registered annually against policemen in last 10 years. 
• A judicial enquiry is mandatory for suspicious deaths. It has been conducted only in 26.4 cases.

According to NCRB, the number of deaths in police custody varies every year. The data reveals that 100 custodial deaths have taken place every year between 2010 -2019 Of these deaths,

• 3.5% have been due to injuries caused by the police
• 28.1 % because of suicide
• 8.6 %, while escaping custody
• Rest, due to other different reasons like illness etc.

Supreme court judgements to protect human rights
The Supreme Court has pronounced many judgements to strengthen the human rights regime. For instance,

• In Arnesh Kumar v State of Bihar (2014): The SC held that even though the offence is non-bailable, an arrest is not mandatory as per Section 41 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
• In Special Action Forum v Union of India (2018): The SC held, the police officer shall explain to the magistrate the reasons necessitated the arrest for further detention of the accused.
• In Prakash Singh v Union of India (2006): The SC recommended separating the investigating police from law and order police to ensure better expertise in the investigation. Similar, recommendations have been given by the National Police Commission (1977-81), 154th Law Commission report (1996) & Malimath committee (2003).
• Malimath committee also recommended that investigation officers should not investigate more than 10 cases a year.
• In DK Basu v State of Bengal (1996): The SC laid down the guidelines to check custodial torture and also mentioned steps to increase transparency & responsibility of police officers during an arrest.
• In Paramvir Singh v Baljit Singh (2020): The Supreme Court has directed States to cover more area of each police station under CCTV cameras and have storage facility of audio-video recording for 18 months. An independent committee shall study the footage and periodically publish reports of its observations. Thus, sufficient steps are being taken to ensure that the abuse of human rights is minimised.

What needs to be done?

• The foremost measure to reduce instances of custodial violence is to reduce the number of arrests. The law on arrest says that arrest for offences punishable up to seven years of imprisonment should be made only when the police officer is satisfied that such arrest is necessary to prevent the person from tampering with evidence, to prevent the person from committing any further offence, etc. 
• Training of police persons to sensitize and encourage them to adopt scientific tools of interrogation. For instance, Narco test, Lie detector test etc.
• As was mentioned by the Home ministry, India needs to link police modernization with police reforms to create a police force that can meet the demands of contemporary times.
• Custodial death is perhaps one of the worst crimes in a civilised society governed by the rule of law. The guilty, therefore, must be punished severely for his misconduct and criminal act. 

Road Ahead

• The police officers must know that their mandate is to protect human rights and not violate them. They need to be sensitised regularly and encouraged to employ scientific tools of interrogation and investigation like the lie detection test, narco test and brainfingerprinting test.

By: Shubham Tiwari