Decided To Abolish Revenue Police System, Uttarakhand Govt Tells Supreme Court

The Supreme Court closed a special leave petition filed by the State of Uttarakhand challenging the Uttarakhand High Court direction to abolish 'Revenue Police System'.

This is after the Court noticed that the State Cabinet decided to accept the decision of the High Court and to take appropriate steps to implement said directions.

In hilly parts of the State, the civil officials of the Revenue Department have powers and functions of Police. Thus the revenue officials could perform functions of police like arrest of offenders and investigation.[Source: ujala.uk.gov.in ]

While considering a criminal appeal in a murder case, the High Court noted this system is resulting in unscientific investigation causing a great miscarriage of justice. 

"In the hilly areas also, the investigation is required to be carried out only by duly trained police officers, who are well conversant with the modern techniques of investigation. The investigation of serious crimes by the Revenue Police results in law and order problem. The investigation should be carried out only by the regular police. The people in hilly areas are required to be given protection and service by the regular police. The detection of crime and protection by revenue police officers is pathetic.", the division bench of Justices Rajiv Sharma and Alok Singh had observed. The following directions were issued :

1. More than a century old practice of Revenue Police System/Policing in vogue in many parts of the State of Uttarakhand is ordered to be abolished within six months from today, in the meantime, the State Government shall put in place the Regular Police System as prevalent in the entire country.
2. The State Government is also directed to open sufficient number of police stations as per Section 2(s) of Cr.P.C. read with Section 7 of the Uttarakhand Police Act, 2007 to strengthen policing by Regular Police within six months from today. 
3. The State Government is also directed to ensure that there are two Police Stations in each Circle headed by an Officer-in-charge, who shall not be below the rank of Sub-Inspector. 
4. The registration of FIRs, investigation and putting up the challan etc. throughout the State of Uttarakhand shall also be done only by the regular police and not by the Patwaris after six months, strictly, as per the provisions of Cr.P.C.
5. The State Government is also directed to open, if not already opened, police training institutions, as per Section 15 of the Act, 2007 including State Police Training Institutions, Police Training Schools, other Training Institutions, including Police Academy for promoting the service culture among police officers and professional qualifications.
6. The State Government is also directed to establish the Bureau of Police Research and Development for undertaking research into matters relating to police and crimes, as per Section 16 of the Act, 2007, within six months from today, in the entire State of Uttarakhand.

Aggrieved with these directives, the State had filed special leave petition before the Apex Court.

When the case came up before the bench of CJI UU Lalit and Justice Bela M. Trivedi, the Deputy Advocate General Jatinder Kumar Sethi submitted before it a note incorporating statement regarding the Cabinet decision. Recording the same, the court disposed of SLP leaving all questions of law open.

Case details: State of Uttarakhand vs Sundar Lal | SLP(Crl) 3546/2018

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