Bangalore: The Supreme Court  laid out stringent guidelines for probes  into police encounters on Tuesday, Sept. 23rd. The court said “treat encounter deaths like custodial deaths”.

The Supreme court guidelines say that the police must record the tip-off that they receive in the case.  After the encounter, they must surrender their  weapons and ammunition. This would facilitate evaluation of the authenticity of the the encounter, said a senior officer. Further, If the encounter results in the death of anyone, the police must immediately register a First Information Report (FIR) and furnish a copy to the jurisdictional court ias per the guidelines.

While, earlier, the CID used to probe only police custodial deaths and some high profile encounters, based on referrals from the government or police. Henceforth, however, circulars would be issued by the government or the DG office to the state CID office to probe into every police encounter.

These directions by the court will not deter the police in using their weapons as a strategic deterrent to prevent a crime in future. The court has also ruled that no cops involved in the encounter death should be given promotion or gallantry awards by the government until the investigations prove that it was genuine.

The Supreme Court has also ordered that the officials probing the encounter killing should submit the status of investigation every six months to the State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) and the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).