Mumbai: Missing 71-yr-old woman with Alzheimer; Police forms SIT to trace her following HC rap

The Mumbai police informed the Bombay High Court on Wednesday that it has appointed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by DCP (Detection-Crime Branch) Sangram Nishandar to trace a 71-year-old woman with Alzheimer's disease/dementia who has been missing for a year.

The HC, on January 31, had directed the Mumbai Commissioner of Police (CP) to form an SIT and produce the woman in court on February 16, 2022. However, public prosecutor Hitendra Dedhia informed the court that SIT was formed on February 14.

To this, the court frowned and questioned the delay in forming the SIT. “Your commissioner takes 15 days to form a committee? She went missing from Kherwadi police station due to the negligence of police officers present at the police station,” said justice S J Kathawalla.

A division bench of justices Kathawalla and Milind Jadhav was hearing a petition filed by the woman’s son, Bhaskar Sarkar, stating that she went missing from her home in Kasarvadvali, Thane, on February 13, 2021. She was found in Kherwadi in Bandra on February 16, 2021 and was taken to the police station there around 10 am. However, she left the police station around 8 pm on her known.

The police were unable to trace her following which the HC had asked for an SIT.

The court was informed that the CP was looking into the investigation done by officers so far. Dedhia informed that three teams have gone to Rajasthan, Gujarat and the interiors of Maharashtra.

The judges questioned Nishandar, who was present in the court, as to when would the woman be produced before the court. Nishandar sought some time saying that the teams will have to check in every district with police stations, hospitals and old age homes.

Justice Kathawalla said: “Someone's mother is missing for a year. Today is exactly one year. It was on February 16, 2021 (that she was taken to Kherwadi police station). Today it is February 16, 2022.”

While granting time, the court has sought for a progress report in the case on the next date of hearing on February 28.