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Lactating mother detained for 6 days: High Court reprimands police

Sentinel Digital Desk

GUWAHATI: A division bench of the Gauhati High Court reprimanded the Dhubri police for detaining a lactating mother and her breastfeeding baby in the police station for six days without arresting them.

Dhubri police apprehended six people, including a lactating mother, on May 25, 2023, in connection with the shooting of a person, Baser Ali, dead under the Bilasipara police station in the Dhubri district. The police could not arrest the accused, Sahjahan. The police then picked up six people, including a lactating mother and her two-and-a-half-year-old breastfeeding baby, and kept them in detention for six days. On May 31, the police arrested two of them and freed the four others.

A kin of the detainees moved the Gauhati High Court with a petition against the police detaining a lactating mother and her breastfeeding baby for six days in the police station, that too without arresting them.

Hearing the petition today, Chief Justice Sandeep Mehta asked the police as to why they had to pick up the lactating mother and her breastfeeding baby at 5 a.m. and not at 10 a.m. The Chief Justice asked the advocate general of the state government why a CBI investigation should not be initiated against the police officials, including the SP, for their total lack of bona fide involvement. The Chief Justice asked the advocate general to file the affidavit regarding the detention.

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