Palghar case: Police recorded wrong time of girls’ arrest

A former senior inspector of the Palghar police stations created a false record of the arrest of two girls in November 2012, the Bombay high court was informed on Wednesday.

A former senior inspector of the Palghar police stations created a false record of the arrest of two girls in November 2012, the Bombay high court was informed on Wednesday.

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Shaheen Dhada, 21, and Rinu Srinivasan, 20, were arrested for posting a comment on Facebook denouncing the bandh called after Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray’s death.

An affidavit filed by Ruprao Deshmukh, joint secretary, home department, said the then senior police inspector Shrikant Pingale had recorded the wrong time of arrest of the girls, thus affecting entries in the station diary and other police records.

This was found during an inquiry conducted by Dr Sukhwinder Singh, special inspector general of police (IGP), Konkan Range.

Singh, who submitted his report on November 23, 2012, concluded that the decision to arrest the girls was taken by Ravindra Sengaonkar, the then Thane Rural superintendent of police, and “attempts to shift the blame on junior officers was unacceptable and absolutely incorrect”.

The affidavit said that both Sengaonkar and Pingale had been placed under suspension with effect from November 27, 2012, pending departmental inquiry.

It also claimed that action against the two officers was “prompt, diligent and effective”.

Assistant public prosecutor Vitthal Konde-Deshmukh tendered the affidavit in response to a petition filed by former journalist Ketan Tirodkar, who has sought penal action against the police.