The Bombay High Court on Wednesday sharply criticised the Palghar police over their handling of a case involving alleged disruption and an attack on medical officials at a private hospital, saying police inaction had allowed nine of the 10 accused named in the first information report to remain absconding.
A division bench of Justices Ajay Gadkari and Kamal Khata said the police had failed to carry out an effective investigation in what it described as a sensitive case involving an alleged assault on medical personnel. The court also warned that the investigation could be transferred to the Mumbai Police crime branch if the Palghar police were not interested in pursuing it.
The case was registered against Shiv Sena members from the Shinde faction over an alleged incident at a Palghar hospital during treatment of an injured man identified in the report as Govind. The court questioned why immediate action had not been taken to arrest the accused after the FIR was registered and why the nine absconding suspects had not been traced despite their identities being known.
Palghar Superintendent of Police Yatish Deshmukh told the court that Rahul Gharat, the Shiv Sena city chief named in the FIR, had been arrested and was in police custody. The remaining nine accused were absconding, according to the information presented before the bench.
The judges said the delay in acting against the accused appeared to have given them an opportunity to flee. The court criticised what it described as extreme irresponsibility and inefficiency in the police response, and said that the investigation did not appear to have proceeded with urgency after the case was registered.
The bench also referred to a July incident at a municipal hospital in Dombivli, where Shiv Sena councillor Ramesh Sukarya Mhatre was accused of attacking doctors. The judges questioned whether the police had learned anything from that case or from the earlier Thane incident involving medical personnel.
The court’s remarks came as it examined the police response in the Palghar matter. The judges said that no meaningful investigation had been carried out in a case involving alleged violence against medical officers and termed that situation unacceptable.
The court has not, according to the report, formally transferred the investigation to the Mumbai Police crime branch. Instead, it warned that such a step could follow if the Palghar police did not demonstrate sufficient interest and urgency in investigating the case. The immediate investigative status and the next court proceedings were not detailed in the report.
