Kerala High Court bars use of police stations for child custody exchange in family disputes

The Kerala High Court recently issued a significant directive to family courts in the State, asking them not to use police stations for the exchange of children during custody battle between their estranged parents [XXX v YYY]..A Division Bench of Justice Devan Ramachandran and Justice MB Snehalatha observed that children should not be subjected to custodial exchange in police stations since such settings are worse than taking them to court premises."However, in the case at hand, we see that when the learned Family Court made an arrangement regarding the interim custody of the child involved, the exchange was directed to be done at a police station. In our view, this is worse than the child being forced to court premises and spaces and are sure that it requires no further expatiation or restatement," the Bench said..The Court issued the directive while dismissing a mother's appeal against an interim custody order passed by a family court at Thrissur..The family court had directed that the father be given temporary custody of the child from May 2 to May 26.As per the order, the father was to bring the child back and produce her before the court on May 27 for further directions.However, while making this interim arrangement, the family court directed that the exchange of the child should take place at a police station.The mother challenged the order of the family court before the High Court, claiming that the child was not safe with the father..The Court noted that by the time the appeal was heard on May 20, both sides had admitted that the child had already been with the father since May 5.Given that the child was due to be returned to the mother soon, the Court found no urgent reason to interfere with the custody arrangement.However, it took strong exception to the family court’s decision to use a police station for the custody handover.Referring to an earlier ruling of the Court, the Bench reiterated that both police stations and court premises are unsuitable for children, especially when they are already distressed by parental disputes."In that view, and particularly adverting to the directions issued in Indu S. (supra), we fail to understand how the learned Family Court could have directed the child to be handed over in interim custody from a police station. We certainly cannot find favour with this," the Court opined.Deeply concerned about the trauma a police station environment could inflict on a child, it issued direction to all family courts to refrain from involving police stations in custody arrangements, whether interim or permanent..The Court ultimately dismissed the appeal, allowing the current interim custody arrangement to continue until the scheduled review by the family court.However, it ordered the Registrar General of the High Court to communicate the present directive to all judges of family courts in the State so that such a practice is not repeated..The mother was represented by advocate VN Sankarjee along with advocates VN Madhusudanan, R Udaya Jyothi, Keerthi B Chandran, Vijayan Pillai PK, Shilpa PS, Unnikrishnan H, Aswin PS and Shriya Merlin Maxwell.The father was represented by advocate CM Charisma..[Read Judgment]