SHRC orders Rs 50K relief for techie ‘humiliated’ by woman inspector over marital dispute in Chennai

CHENNAI: The State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) has ordered the payment of Rs 50,000 in compensation to a techie who was assaulted and ill-treated by an inspector attached to Tambaram all-women police station during a ‘katta panchayat; (kangaroo court) in a marital dispute with his wife.Commission member V Kannadasan directed the state to recover the amount from the personal funds of inspector C Sumathi andinitiate disciplinary action against her. According to complainant V Sagaya Praveen, the inspector forced his mother to hand over the keys of her house to his wife at the police station.Sagaya Praveen, an IT company executive from Kamarajapuram at Anakaputhur, and his wife Mary Mercy were living separately due to family issues. He said Sumathi, who was then an inspector at Tambaram all-women police station, acted under the influence of Antony Stalin, who was the inspector at Chengalpet Town Police Station and a relative of his wife.In 2020, Sumathi allegedly summoned Praveenand his family to the station and forcibly took the key to a house registered in his mother’s name and handed it to his wife, effectively conducting a ‘kangaroo court’, he said. Praveen alleged that when he refused to hand over the key, he was assaulted in front of his wife’s kin, forced to sit on the ground, and humiliated.Allowing the complaint, the commission concluded that the inspector violated the human rights of the complainant and ordered the compensation. The inspector from Tambaram all-women police station had convened a kangaroo court to resolve a marital dispute.