Mumbai Police Hotel Raid: Commissioner Rakesh Maria orders probe into alleged moral policing

Taking cognizance of the Malwani police's raid of hotels around Aksa Beach, Madh Island, Mumbai Police Commissioner Rakesh Maria has ordered into last week's detention of couples.

On Thursday afternoon, the Malvani police conducted raids and took around 40 couples to the police station. The raid was ostensibly was to crack down to prostitution based on information received by an informer. While three cases were booked under the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act or PITA Act, the rest of the couples were fined Rs 1200 and charged with “indecent behaviour in public”, even though they were in hotel rooms. They were also kept at the station till 10 pm. According to a report in Mid Day, one of the girls who questioned the draconian measures, she was slapped by a female constable.

The cops also made several of the couples, who were college students, call up their parents. One girl told Mid Day: “The police first insulted all of us in front of all the officers and the other couples and then forced us to call our parents and insulted and disgraced us in front of them. They also made the parents feel guilty as if their children had committed some heinous crime.” The incident was widely condemned on social media, with the Twitterati questioning the police's high-handedness. Here are some of the Tweets: 

*Theft in city* Mumbai Police - Areh Jaau de re Mhatre *Couples entering room* Mumbai Police - THIS IS SPARTA !!

— Shaktimaan Thackeray (@Madan_Chikna) August 8, 2015

Dear #MumbaiPolice arresting consenting adults is not what they meant when they asked u to hunt down sleeper cells

— Neeti Palta (@neetipalta) August 8, 2015

It's raids like these in Mumbai that lead to the police's caricature-like portrayal in films. And do nothing for its global city aspirations

— Ashok Lalla (@ashoklalla) August 8, 2015

#MumbaiPolice deserve all the brickbats...but stop to pause n think who gave such instructions! Why have the cops never acted this way b4?

— Mohit Anand (@amohit17) August 8, 2015