Justice Suraj Govindaraj issued directions while disposing of a petition filed by a 65-year-old man who complained about the 2024 police action in classifying an FIR registered in 2020 as ‘inactive’ based on his complaint about his missing cousin | Photo credit: FILE PHOTO
Considering that 10,796 persons who went missing between 2020-2025 have not yet been traced, the Karnataka High Court directed the state government to report on the effective implementation of the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) evolved on the basis of the court’s directions for registration, investigation and investigation of complaints of missing persons.
Justice Suraj Govindaraj issued the directions while disposing of a petition filed by a 65-year-old man who complained about the police’s 2024 action in classifying a First Information Report (FIR) registered in 2020 based on his complaint about his missing cousin as “inactive”.
When considering the proposal, the court sought data on complaints of missing persons, including children under the age of 17, from 2020-2025. Apart from submitting missing persons data, the police department has also submitted an SOP, which has evolved to compile several circulars issued since 2007 on handling of missing persons complaints, following a directive issued in this regard by the court department in September 2025.
More untraced girls
From the data, the court noted that in 2025 in particular, more girls in the age group of 13 to 17 years went missing and more of these girls remained missing compared to untraceable boys in this age group.
According to data from 1,26,508 people reported missing between 2020 and 2025, 10,796 people remain untraceable.
Of the total number of 71,699 reported missing women, 2,981 remained untraceable, and of the total number of 38,073 missing men, 6,470 women remained untraceable during this period. Among children, 16,736 (4,864 boys and 11,872 girls) were missing and 1,345 (386 boys and 959 girls) remained untraceable.
The data also shows that teenage girls (ages 13 to 17) are the highest number of missing children, with 3,769 missing during this period. The data also reveals that tracking rates collapsed significantly with male tracking rates in 2025.
Report to submit
The court has now specifically asked the state government to submit a report on the establishment of district missing persons units, a quarterly review report of the monitoring committees and a digital portal for tracking missing persons, information sharing with the police of other states and the number of missing persons cases currently under investigation, including the number of cases classified as active, dormant or traced.
Published – 16 March 2026 20:55 IST
