‘Prima facie cognisable offence made out’: Bombay HC directs govt to register FIR in Parbhani custodial death in a week

The court observed that there was “prima facie material on record” to show that “cognizable offence was made out”, therefore the state should have registered the FIR.

Suryawanshi (35), a labourer who was pursuing law, was among nearly 50 people arrested by the Parbhani police on December 11, 2024 following violent protests staged against December 10 vandalisation of a replica of Constitution outside Parbhani Railway station.

Suryawanshi, belonging to a nomadic tribe, died in judicial custody in a local jail on December 15 last year, which police claimed was due to heart attack.

A division bench of Justices Vibha V Kanknanwadi and Sanjay A Deshmukh passed an interim order on plea by Vijayabai Vyankat Suryawanshi, mother of Somnath, who alleged that he died due to custodial torture and brutality by police officers.

The government had transferred the probe from local police to the state CID.

Advocate Prakash Ambedkar, appearing for the mother, argued that despite the Judicial Magistrate having inquired into custodial death under section 196 of the Bhartiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), the state government was not ready for registering FIR and taking further action.

The magistrial inquiry had concluded that the police officers were responsible for his death.

The petitioner, among other prayers, sought from court the direction to the state government to register FIR under section 103 (punishment for murder) and other provisions of Bhartiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) along with sections of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

Justice Kankanwadi observed that in case of any medical query about death of a person, the inquiry or investigating usually approach the medical officers who conducted the autopsy.

However, in the present case, “interestingly, the Deputy Superintendent of Police, State CID, has taken his own decision to make queries and seek opinion from a team of medical experts from JJ Hospital (state run), Mumbai and the Committee appears to have given a report on April 4, 2025 to Deputy Superintendent of Police, state CID, Parbhani.”

The HC said that while it would not express opinion at present, the question that required to be gone into was why he did not seek an opinion of the seven-member team from Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar that conducted the autopsy.

Justice Kankanwadi for the bench perused “entire record” and noted that there were 24 visible injuries as per postmortem report along with internal injuries. “The question would then arise as to who has caused those injuries,” HC said.

As per records, the bench said age of injuries was between few hours to four days before the death and all abrasions were between two to four days before the death and the team of seven doctors had given a probable cause of death as “shock following multiple injuries”.

“Now, when there was prima facie material on record i.e. on the basis of inquest panchanama, postmortem report, report of Judicial Magistrate First Class under Section 196 of BNSS and the complaint application by the petitioner, a cognizable office was made out and, therefore, State ought to have registered the FIR. The guidelines in Lalita Kumari v. State of Uttar Pradesh, were prima facie made out,” the HC held.

“We are of the opinion that the material which she was placing before the police, were sufficient for registration of the FIR,” the HC held in its interim order, posting further hearing on other prayers in the plea to July 30,