Prasanna S case: Madras High Court issues guidelines to curb police harassment during probe

The Madras High Court recently issued guidelines to curb instances of police harassment during criminal investigations [Prasanna Sankaranarayanan v. State]..The guidelines were issued in a March 27 order passed by Justice GK Ilanthiraiyan on a plea by the co-founder of Rippling, Prasanna Sankaranarayanan, who moved the Court alleging that police have been harassing him at the behest of his estranged wife, Dhivya Sashidhar.The Court, in response, sounded a word of caution against police engaging in such harassment during any criminal investigation. "This Court, exercising its power under Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, normally would not interfere with the investigation conducted by a police officer. Nevertheless, it would also not turn a blind eye to instances of harassment by the police under the guise of investigation is brought to its notice," it said. .It further noted that harassment may mean different things."What could be harassment to the petitioners may not be the same to the police officer," it explained. .The Court proceeded to issue the following general guidelines to minimise the possibility of police harassment under the guise of police investigation:1. When any person named in a criminal complaint or any witness is summoned, the police should issue a written summons under Section 179 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS), specifying the date and time for appearance before the police for enquiry/ investigation. 2. The minutes of the enquiry must be recorded in the general diary/ station diary/ diary of the police station. 3. The police officer must refrain from harassing persons called upon for enquiry/ investigation. 4. The guidelines on preliminary enquiry or registration of first information reports (FIR) in the Supreme Court judgment in Lalita Kumari Vs. Government of Uttar Pradesh shall be strictly adhered to. .A thread on X (formerly Twitter) by Prasanna Sankaranarayanan recently went viral after he accused his wife of filing false cases in a bid to abduct their son and take him out of the country amid ongoing matrimonial disputes.Earlier this week, Sankaranarayanan moved the High Court claiming that the Tamil Nadu police have been continuously harassing him and trying to take his son away from him owing to a false kidnapping complaint filed by his estranged wife..He claimed that the police had tried to enter his hotel room on March 7 to take away the child, although Sankaranarayanan had left the hotel room sometime earlier, rendering the police's attempt unsuccessful.He alleged that between March 12 and March 21, the police visited his mother and his friend, Gokul S, to trace Sankaranarayanan's whereabouts.He added that the police were shown over video call that his son was happy with the father, but that this allegedly did not stop the police from continuing to hound him. He submitted that the police even detained Gokul S at the police station for days without an FIR to coerce Sankaranarayanan to hand over his son. He maintained that all of this was set in motion through a false kidnapping complaint filed by his wife against him. He claimed that his wife was trying to gain leverage in ongoing divorce and child custody battles by filing such false cases. He added that she had tried to file false cases against him earlier in the US and Singapore as well, though to no avail. .These allegations have been refuted by Sankaranarayanan's wife, Dhivya Sashidhar, who has reportedly said that she filed the kidnapping complaint only to trace the whereabouts of their son. According to a report by Financial Express, she added that she and her child were forcibly brought to India from Singapore by her husband, citing a property dispute, and that Sankaranarayanan has a criminal history..The Court on March 27 disposed of Sankaranarayanan's plea after it issued guidelines instructing the police to refrain from harassing anyone during investigations. Senior Advocates A Ramesh and Geeta Luthra and advocates Aadarsh Kothari, Ashwini Ramesh, Deepika Murali, Anila Rajendran, Karthik Sundaram, Nivea SR, Harinarayanan K and Raja M represented Sankaranarayanan. Government Advocate A Gopinath represented the State. .[Read Order]