One month after murder in Mugalli locality of Sao Jose de Areal, South police chief and Collector at loggerheads over the issue
GUILHERME ALMEIDA
MARGAO: It was exactly a month ago that the cold-blooded murder of 67-year-old retired engineer Satish Kudchadkar in the Mugalli locality of Sao Jose de Areal village spurred the district police chief and the then Collector to rein in on landlords renting their premises to migrants sans intimation to the nearest police station.
Both the District Collector N D Agrawal and the district police chief Shekhar Prabhudessai lost no time in warning the erring landlords that non-intimation about tenants to police would attract punishment, including imprisonment for violating the Collector’s order issued under section 144 of the Cr PC.
A month later, erring landlords are virtually having a field day, with the office of the district police chief and the Collector still at loggerheads over a simple question – whether the police or the Collector should lodge a FIR against the landlords.
Otherwise, just consider this: Since December 24, the day when the retired WRD engineer Kudchadkar was done to death inside his house, the Maina-Curtorim police has forwarded to the office of Sub-divisional Magistrate, Margao, 20 complaints against landlords for leasing out the premises without intimating the nearest police station.
Sadly, not a single FIR stands registered against landlords at the police stations till date as the warring men-in-uniform and the Collectorate officials are still to arrive at an understanding as to who amongst the two should lodge the FIR.
Even Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar’s intervention has not helped to overcome the embarrassing situation. Upon request of the Chief Minister, Advocate General Atmaram Nadkarni gave his clear-cut opinion that the responsibility of lodging the FIR wrests with the police, but it has not helped resolve the row. Directions issued by the Home Department to implement the Advocate General’s opinion after a nod from the Chief Minister have literally gone abegging.
Says district police chief Shekhar Prabhudessai: “In North Goa, the district Collector has issued an order to all his sub-ordinate sub-divisional magistrates to set in motion the process of lodging FIRs against the erring landlords. The same system can be implemented in South district as well”.
When this reporter drew attention of district Collector Venancio Furtado to the unusual situation, he promised to look into the matter and act accordingly. Sources in the district Collectorate maintained that the Collector will act only as per the legal opinion of the advocate general, which cast responsibility on the police to lodge the FIR. “The Advocate general’s opinion only mandates the Collector or his sub-ordinate officer to submit a report in the court at the time of filing chargesheet against a landlord after investigation”, remarked the Collectorate official, while suggesting the intervention of the Chief Minister to resolve the imbroglio in the interest of
security.
