The Supreme Court has temporarily halted a Punjab and Haryana High Court order to investigate the alleged abduction of a dentist by Chandigarh police personnel. The High Court had ordered the registration of an FIR and set up an SIT to probe the matter, but the Supreme Court has put the order on hold for five weeks.
The dentist, Mohit Dhawan, had filed a suit for the recovery of outstanding dues owed to him by a woman from Nairobi for her treatment. This led to his implication in complaints of improper treatment allegedly provided to the woman. Three separate complaints were filed against him, and in two of them, he managed to get anticipatory bail. In the third complaint, he was asked to appear before a magistrate, but on the day of the hearing, he was allegedly abducted by a team of Chandigarh crime branch police.
During the hearing, the Additional Solicitor General, KM Nataraj, argued that the High Court’s order for registration of an FIR against police officials and a probe by a Special Investigation Team of Punjab Police was without any jurisdiction. Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing Dhawan, claimed that this was one of the worst cases of police excesses he had seen.
The Supreme Court bench of Justices AS Bopanna and Hima Kohli sought a response from Dhawan and directed the Chandigarh police to preserve the records, including CCTV footage and call details, in connection with the case. The court said that the case needs to be considered at length, and that is why the High Court’s order is being stayed. The bench has posted the matter for further hearing after five weeks.
The Chandigarh administration has filed a plea, which the Supreme Court will hear on Friday. The administration claims that the case relates to Dhawan, against whom a criminal case was lodged after a Nairobi national accused him of cheating her when she came to India during 2017-18 to get dental implants from his clinic.
On March 3, the High Court had ordered the Punjab DGP to constitute an SIT within a week, stating that the case had the potential to shake the confidence of the common man in the administration of justice. If the incidents, as alleged by the petitioner, are found to be true, the conduct of police officers would amount to subverting the course of justice by causing interference in the implementation of orders passed by the courts, the High Court had said.
