NEW DELHI, 7 Aug: As Manipur sank deeper into ethnic violence, the Supreme Court on Monday ordered setting up of a committee of three former women high court judges to oversee relief and rehabilitation (R&R) of victims and compensation to them, besides asking former Maharashtra police chief Dattatray Padsalgikar to monitor the probe in criminal cases.
Observing that its effort is to restore people’s faith in the rule of law in the strife-torn state, the top court also decided to monitor the overall situation there.
The court said that three-member panel will be submitting reports to it directly.
A bench chaired by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud said that the committee will be headed by former Jammu & Kashmir High Court chief justice Gita Mittal and include retired justices Shalini P Joshi, a former judge of the Bombay High Court, and Asha Menon, an ex-judge of the Delhi High Court.
Cognisant of reports about the border state descending deeper into chaos, with more and more people getting killed and arson and mayhem prevailing, the bench, also comprising Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, which had termed “deeply disturbing” the video of women being paraded naked, said it will appoint a committee of three former high court judges to oversee relief and rehabilitation of those affected.
“We will appoint a committee of three former high court judges,” the bench said, adding that the panel will be looking at issues including relief, remedial measures, rehabilitation, compensation and also restoration of homes and places of worship.
The bench said that the committee of judges will visit the relief camps and assess the conditions there.
On the investigation of cases, the court said that 11 FIRs will be transferred to the CBI.
“We are not going to supplant the CBI because you (the state government) have the investigating agency which will be looking after the investigation,” the bench said.
The top court said that, to ensure that there is a sense of faith, it will direct that at least five officers, not below the rank of deputy superintendents of police, be brought into the CBI on deputation from various states to oversee the probe.
It said that these officers will be functioning within the administrative setup of the CBI and may be supervised by an officer of the rank of joint director in the central agency.
“We are going to add one more layer of scrutiny for us. We have already identified the officer,” the bench said, adding that former Maharashtra DGP Dattatray Padsalgikar will monitor the overall investigation and keep apprising it of the developments.
It said that, as per the report placed before it by Attorney General R Venkataramani and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and the state government, about 42 state SITs will be looking at the cases which will not be transferred to the CBI.
The bench said that, for each of these SITs, at least one inspector from another state be brought on deputation to the Manipur Police.
It said that these 42 SITs should be supervised by six DIG rank officers who will come in from outside the state of Manipur.
The bench said that a detailed order will be uploaded on the apex court website later in the evening.
During the hearing, Manipur Chief Secretary Vineet Joshi and state DGP Rajiv Singh appeared before the bench.
The top law officers submitted a report, which the apex court had sought on 1 August, on issues including the segregation of cases.
“The government is handling the situation at a very mature level,” the attorney general told the bench.
The government law officers said that the state government proposed to set up special investigation teams (SIT), headed by the superintendent of police at the district level, to probe sensitive cases. The CBI has been asked to investigate 11 cases.
A battery of lawyers, including senior advocate Indira Jaising, Sanjay Hegde, CU Singh, Gopal Sankaranarayanan and lawyers Prashant Bhushan, Vrinda Grover, Nizam Pasha and Vishal Tiwari gave suggestions to the bench on setting up of SITs for investigating cases of ethnic violence.
The directions by the top court came days after it said on 1 August that there is a complete breakdown of law and order and constitutional machinery in Manipur.
It had rapped the state police for its “tardy” and “lethargic” probe of incidents of ethnic violence, especially those targeting women, and had summoned the DGP to answer its queries on 7 August.
The Centre had urged the bench that instead of the two FIRs related to a video showing women being paraded naked by a mob, 11 out of 6,523 FIRs linked to violence against women and children may be transferred to the CBI and tried out of Manipur.
The bench is hearing around 10 petitions related to the spiralling violence, including those seeking court-monitored probe into cases, besides measures for relief and rehabilitation.
More than 160 people have been killed and several hundred injured since ethnic violence first broke out in the state on 3 May. (PTI)