No way out of police file

The black and white passport size photograph of Vidya Kale has been a constant on the criminal display board of Vishrambaug police station f...

The black and white passport size photograph of Vidya Kale has been a constant on the criminal display board of Vishrambaug police station for the last six years. The placard below it calls her a 8216;8216;habitual criminal8217;8217;.

Kale8217;s crime: Stealing mopeds and abandoning them after they ran out of petrol. As a 17-year-old, she was accused of eight such cases.

But that was more than six years ago. Presently studying law at Bharatiya Vidya Peeth in Pune, Kale has moved on. For the court acquitted her in all the cases by 2000.

However, for the Pune police Kale is still a branded a criminal, states her PIL filed in Mumbai High Court.

In 2002, she sent a complaint letter to the Home Ministry, informing authorities that the police still treated her as a history-sheeter and 8216;8216;expected routine visits from her to the police station8217;8217;.

8216;8216;Whenever there is a new in-charge of a police station, I am called by a written notice to present myself before the senior inspector8217;8217;, the complaint states. Kale pleads that since her 8216;8216;family is looking at marriage proposals8217;8217;, her past would mar her prospects.

Nearly 13 months later, Kale says she got a reply from the Modus Operandi Bureau MOB. The police department rejected her appeal unceremoniously, no questions answered.

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A city police officer says, for Vidya, moving the court could be the only way out, since a senior police inspector exercises his discretion in deciding whether the photograph of a 8216;8216;known8217;8217; or 8216;8216;absconding8217;8217; accused should be displayed in his station.

8216;8216;In such a scenario, the person concerned should go to the court, which can issue directions to the inspector,8217;8217; the officer adds. If the inspector doesn8217;t comply with the court order, his action would amount to contempt of court.

The division bench of Chief Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud on Wednesday asked the state government and the Commissioner of Police to file replies to the PIL and Kale8217;s allegations for the next hearing, to be held after two weeks.

The PIL asks whether there are any rules or criteria governing the display of photographs of accused persons at police stations and the maintenance of history sheets of such offenders.

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According to her counsel Uday Warunjkar, 8216;8216;There are no rules, no guidelines that police follow. Otherwise, why would a person acquitted in all her cases in 2000 still be asked to visit the station?8217;8217;

with inputs from Abhishek Sharan