HC tells Centre to help trace missing Ramnad CRPF jawan

The Madurai bench of Madras High Court on Wednesday directed the Centre to help trace a missing CRPF jawan.

A habeas corpus petition filed by Vanitha from Mudukulathur of Ramanathapuram district came up for hearing before a division bench of Justice R Subramanian and Justice N Sathish Kumar.

The petitioner stated that her husband Balamurugan, joined the CRPF and served with a battalion in Chhattisgarh, but much to their shock, Balamurugan went missing since October 17 last year. The petitioner was informed by the office, from where he served, that Balamurugan was found missing. Despite making appeals to authorities concerned to help find her missing husband, no effort has been made to bring him back home safe. Citing these, the petitioner sought direction from the court to secure the safe return of her missing husband.

Meanwhile, the counsel on behalf of the Centre said efforts were on to trace the missing jawan. It was known that the cell phone number used earlier by the jawan has been changed and replaced with new numbers. With this new contact number, the police were able to trace the location of the user and collating details of call history, the counsel added.

The bench, after hearing, directed the Centre to trace the missing CRPF jawan at the earliest with the aid of the state government of Chhattisgarh and Sukma police and file a report. The case is adjourned to March 23.