Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru (SP)

Mangaluru, Dec 2: The Supreme Court, which took up hearing of special leave petitions (SLP)(criminal) No. 7692/2014 and 7687/2014 filed on behalf of Dakshina Kannada district superintendent of police, Dr Sharanappa S D and the then Beltangady police circle inspector, Lingappa Poojary, dismissed an earlier order passed by a single judge bench of Karnataka high court, suspending the above officials as well as the then station house officer of Betangady police station, Babu Gowda (assistant sub inspector).

This was stated by the district superintendent of police, Sharanappa, here on Monday December 1.

Earlier, the Supreme Court had, on September 26 this year, had stayed operation of the above order of the high court after admitting the above two SLPs.

The case relates to construction of a temple dedicated to Kanjarpa at Ujire of which Mahesh Shetty Thimarody was the head of the temple construction committee. Shashikala Shetty, whose father happened to head this committee earlier, and her husband, Taranath Shetty, had approached the high court, alleging that the temple that was proposed to be constructed in government land was coming up in the land owned by Taranath. They had held police officer responsible for not taking up their complaints relating to this case seriously.

The state high court had summoned the police officers for personal appearance under criminal petition No 3708/2014. On the failure of the officers to be present on July 30 this year in the court, the high court ordered the chief secretary in home department to keep the superintendent of police, Dakshina Kannada district, Beltangady police circle inspector and Beltangady station house officer who were in charge on May 10, 2014 at 10 am under suspension till investigation in the case is completed. The high court reasoned that their suspension was required to ensure that they do not interfere with investigation. It had also ordered a case to be registered with the police city crime branch Mangalore and investigtion to be conducted.

The special leave petitions filed by the police officers were taken up and order of their suspensions dismissed by the Supreme Court which observed that the impugned order does not conform to section 482 of Criminal Procedure Corde. It also said that no such order can be issued without holding investigation or hearing the cases.