Court upholds order for FIR against police officer for assaulting dog

A Delhi court has upheld a magisterial court order directing FIR against a police official for allegedly hitting a stray dog with a stick in northeast Delhi in January 2022.

Principal district and sessions judge Sukhvinder Kaur observed the Delhi Police sub-inspector could not claim protection of law to public servants for discharging their duties as "the act of beating a dog is not covered under the official duty".

The judge was hearing the revision plea of assistant sub-inspector Ravindra from Jaffrabad police station, against the February 2023 order of a magisterial court.

Ravindra challenged the order on several grounds, including he acted in self-defence after being bitten by the dog. He argued the alleged incident occurred when he was performing his official duty and there was no maiming of the stray dog, besides the alleged video of the incident on social media being "selective and incomplete".

On July 18, the court said, "It is apparent from the status report given by the assistant commissioner of police (ACP) concerned and the report of public grievances (PG) cell that under the garb of police inquiry the police has conducted investigation by recording statements of local residents, complainants, accused, doctors, which appears to have been done only to save the revisionist (Ravindra) who is a police personnel." Ravindra's plea seeking protection for a public servant under law was held to without merit.

"The plea of the revisionist (Ravindra) to the effect that the stray dog has not received any grievous injury or was not maimed, is also not sustainable since the police have not even conducted the medical examination of the dog," the court said.

The police, the order said, instead of medically examining the dog, themselves concluded that the dog was not maimed.

"I do not find any error in the finding of the metropolitan magistrate to the effect that the police has conducted investigation under the garb of inquiry and the police had chosen to give clean chit to the proposed accused in inquiry proceedings despite reaching the conclusion that the victim dog was indeed assaulted by the proposed accused who is deployed in the very same area where the incident took place," the court said.

Judge Kaur said there was no error in the magisterial court's finding that, prima facie, several offences were committed which required investigation.

Agreeing with the trial court, the court underlined the need for a "proper investigation" to establish the authenticity of the video, recording statements of residents of the locality, eye witnesses and doctors who treated the dog and ensuring the protection of witnesses besides the "recovery of the weapon of offence".

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)