The Supreme Court on Tuesday rebuked the Bihar Police for failing to invoke appropriate charges to deal with cases of sexual abuse in 14 shelter homes in the state. The court accused the police of invoking less serious charges, hinting that it may hand all the cases over to the CBI.
Slamming the Nitish Kumar-led government, the court said its attitude in the matter was “shameless, extremely unfortunate and tragic”. “What are you (Bihar government) doing? It is shameful. If the child is sodomised you say it’s nothing? How can you do this? It’s inhuman. We are told that the matter will be looked with great seriousness…this is seriousness? Every time I read this file, it’s tragic,” the three-judge bench comprising Justices Madan B. Lokur, S. Abdul Nazeer and Deepak Gupta said during the hearing, as reported by news agency ANI.
The court has given the state government 24 hours to add charges under Section 377 (rape) of the IPC and POSCO Act in the FIR, ANI reported.
Also read: Bihar Shelter Home Case: SC Expresses Concern Over Rape Incidents in Country
A petition filed by journalist Nivedita Jha through advocate Fauzia Shakil sought “registration of FIR and independent investigations or court-monitored probe into the affairs of these 14 (other) shelter homes in Bihar mentioned in the TISS report”.
The alleged sexual exploitation of the girls was first highlighted in an audit report submitted by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) to the state’s social welfare department in April.
TISS, which conducted an audit of shelter homes, earlier told the court that out of 110 such institutions in Bihar, “grave concerns” have been raised in 15 of them.
In all, sexual abuse of 34 inmates out of 42 was confirmed in their medical examination, while two others who were unwell were yet to undergo medical tests.
An FIR was lodged against 11 people, including Brajesh Thakur, the chief of an NGO which ran the shelter home in Muzaffarpur where girls were allegedly raped and sexually abused, on May 31.
The investigation into the Mujaffarpur shelter home was was taken over by the CBI on July 29, after the Bihar opposition parties put pressure on the Nitish Kumar government.