A Bulgarian national has filed a charge of rape and human trafficking against the chief medical officer of a prominent Indian pharmaceutical business. The Gujarat High Court has ordered the chief judicial magistrate to issue an order for an inquiry by a qualified police officer.
Given the facts and circumstances of the case, the court of Justice Hasmukh Suthar ordered that the inquiry be finished in two months under the supervision of a senior IPS officer who had been selected by the Deputy Inspector General (Law and Order).
According to the court, police officers have also been the target of serious accusations that they have not performed their duties. It gave the government instructions to investigate the situation and punish negligent police officers for their inactivity and negligence.
A Bulgarian national filed a petition with the Gujarat High Court seeking permission to file a formal complaint (FIR) against the chief executive officer (CMD) of a prominent Indian pharmaceutical company for various offenses, including sexual assault, assault, criminal intimidation, and human trafficking, as well as against police officers for failing to file a formal complaint.
She begged that even though she had gone to the police and complained, they had not opened an investigation or filed a formal complaint. She said that when she filed a private case against the accused, the magistrate court dismissed it.
She asked the court for permission to overturn the chief judicial magistrate’s decision to reject her private complaint against the defendants. The court noted that, even with knowledge of their rights, victims of sexual assault find it difficult to address or settle their complaints through the current system because of many flaws.
Only a few brave victims prepare to face suffering and file a lawsuit. It stated that police authorities and knowledgeable magistrates should have handled such allegations delicately given the current circumstances.
The magistrate’s order has to be overturned because, according to the court, it disregarded established legal norms. The court declared that just directing an inquiry into the complaint’s accusations would not in any way harm anyone.
The High Court noted that if the police discover information about criminal conduct at an early stage, they must file a complaint and look into the offense as per the guidelines established by the highest court in the Lalita Kumari (Supra) case. The Bulgarian national claimed in her appeal that she joined the pharmaceutical company on November 24, 2022, after traveling to India in search of work as a flight attendant.
Her job description was altered, and she was assigned to travel and work alongside the company’s CMD as a personal attendant and butler. She experienced sexual harassment at work, and the plea claimed that on April 3, 2023, she lost her job because she refused to give in to unlawful demands.
Regarding this, the petitioner wrote to both her Foreign Regional Registration Office and her Embassy. After filing an affidavit in the Mahila police station declaring that she had resolved the problem with her employer, she said she was subsequently pressured to drop her case and got a demand draft for ₹24 lakh from the employer.
She then filed a private complaint with the magistrate court, which dismissed the first complaint and refused to record the second one. She also submitted a second complaint to the police commissioner.
According to the HC, as the charges were cognizable, the magistrate had a responsibility to forward the complaint to a police inquiry under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). The HC stated that despite the petitioner’s repeated attempts to get the evidence through the police, the court placed the burden of producing the proof in support of the claims made in the May 5, 2023 complaint without giving her a chance to be heard.
The court noted that although the complaint initially revealed crimes that were punishable by law and were not compoundable, including the allegation of human trafficking, it was the responsibility of the police to conduct a thorough and unbiased investigation into the claims. In the case of human trafficking, the victim’s consent is irrelevant.
