Madras HC refuses to handover body of custodial torture victim to family, directs police to re-bury him

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court refused to hand over the body of a 43-year-old person from the Scheduled Caste (SC) community to his family, after recording the re-postmortem report, as the deceased's wife alleged custodial torture and directed the State to re-bury the deceased body.

Justice R Sakthivel directed the Villupuram government medical college hospital to hand over the deceased body to the district collector, to re-bury the body.

The judge allowed only 12 persons from the petitioner's family to attend the reinterment and granted liberty to perform rituals at the burial ground if they so desired and it should be concluded within two hours, the judge directed.

The Court also directed the district collector to avoid deploying policemen inside the burial ground unless exigency arises.

The government advocate submitted that the body of the deceased was exhumed and a re-postmortem was performed on May 22, the body has been kept in the mortuary at Villupuram Government Medical College and Hospital.

The petitioner's counsel submitted that when the wife of the deceased represented before the district collector to hand over her husband's body, it did not accede.

Further, the counsel also submitted that the deployment of policemen in the burial ground during reinterment would create a hostile and unpleasant atmosphere for the petitioner and her family.

Petitioner Anju moved a petition before the High Court seeking to conduct a re-postmortem on her husband's body with a videograph to find out antemortem injuries due to the custodial torture by Villupuram police.

The petitioner contended that on April 10, sub inspector of the Villupuram taluk police station took her husband Raja into custody from his workplace and was illegally detained in the police station.

Further, the police personnel brutally attacked her husband and she also found injuries all over his body, after he was released on the same day, said the petitioner. Since her husband's health deteriorated, he was taken to the government hospital in Villupuram, where the doctors found out that Raja was brought dead.

The Postmortem was conducted within 30 minutes, in a hasty manner, the petitioner contended. The police personnel threatened her to cremate the body as against the petitioner's customary practice, however, the body was buried, said the petitioner.

The petitioner also submitted that no action has been taken to her representation made before Villupuram SP seeking permission to conduct a re-postmortem to establish the custodial torture.

While hearing the petition, the High Court directed the State to exhume the body and conduct a re-postmortem to find out injuries in his body.