MUMBAI: A day after being pulled up by the Bombay high court, the state government on Thursday withdrew its controversial circular that instructed policemen not to record in their station diaries politicians' calls in cases under investigation. It plans to issue another circular which will leave it to the discretion of the police officer on duty to mention or omit a politician's instructions.
A senior Mantralaya official said, "The police manual says that it is for the police officer to decide.'' Home minister R R Patil has instructed the department to rework the draft for issuing a fresh circular, the official added.
A day earlier, while hearing a petition challenging the November 11, 2010 circular of the home department , a division bench of Justices Ranjana Desai and R V More had termed the order as "odd" . The court said that politicians should not make calls to investigating officers. "If they do, why should any police officer be prevented from making an entry of the calls in the station diary?" it asked. The HC said it would decide on the merits of the case if the home department continued with the circular and sought a reply by June 15.
Asenior police officer said the government was forced to withdraw the circular after the high court made it quite clear that it was against such directions. "Last year in the legislative council, some MLAs had expressed their apprehension after the Supreme Court imposed a fine on Vilasrao Deshmukh (see box). The MLAs said they would have no choice but to call up policemen when their voters approached them,'' the officer said.
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