People’s Watch, a Madurai-based human rights organisation has sought the intervention of State Human Rights Commission to take suo moto cognizance of the inhumane police action of handcuffing a Pocso case victim in The Nilgiris district earlier this month.

Henri Tiphagne, director of the human rights organisation People’s Watch, based in Madurai, has taken strong exception to a woman constable taking a 15-year-old Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act victim to the court handcuffed to record a statement. The victim, said Tiphagne in a complaint to the Chief Justice of the Madras High Court, was accompanied by a woman police constable from Annai Sathya Home to the magistrate court in Kotagiri to record a statement under section 164. The woman police constable took the victim in a bus to Kotagiri from Ooty.