Observing that the Goonda Act was a potent weapon for police personnel, IGP Southern Range A S N Murthy called upon officers to learn the technicalities related to the act and use it effectively.
He was speaking at the day-long workshop on ‘The Karnataka prevention of dangerous activities of bootleggers, drug-offenders, gamblers, goondas, immoral traffic offenders and slum-grabbers act 1985,’ organised jointly by Mysore district police and JSS Law College here on Monday.
He said the act allows police personnel to use preventive detention as a measure only if the district magistrate or the commissioner of police is satisfied with the reasons. Citing examples, he said a total of 27 cases were booked in four districts of Hassan, Mandya, Chamarajanagar and Kodagu during 2010. However, the police were successful in arguing only one case in Chamarajanagar, while the remaining managed to get their detention cancelled. He said according to the Supreme Court, a solitary case is enough for a miscreant being taken into preventive detention.
E S Indresh, government advocate, High Court, discussed the aspects related to the act with the police officers. SP R Dileep, Commissioner K L Sudheer, deputy commissioner P S Vastrad, additional deputy commissioner Naganaik and JSS Law college principal K S Suresh were present.
Police top brass arrive late
The top brass of the police force in the district probably wouldn’t be the best to explain to their officers about punctuality.Top brass including IGP Southern Range A S N Murthy, SP R Dileep and police commissioner K L Sudheer arrived at the programme nearly one hour late.
Nearly 200 police personnel including inspectors, sub-inspectors and constables had arrived at nearly 9 am for the programme which eventually started at 11 am. When queried, IGP said, “I was told the programme was at 11 am.”
