Supreme Court notes delay in rape verdicts, ‘unrest’ among people.

Source – indianexpress.com

Taking note of the widespread disenchantment over delay in deciding rape cases and other sexual offences, the Supreme Court on Wednesday decided to take stock of effectiveness of the criminal justice system in responding to the situation and called for status reports from the Centre, state governments, Union Territories and various High Courts on implementation of the law.

A bench of Chief Justice of India S A Bobde and Justices B R Gavai and Surya Kant, which took suo motu cognizance of the issue, sought information on a variety of provisions. This includes utilisation of the Nirbhaya Fund and investigation and trial of such offences.

The fund was created in 2013 for projects of women safety to support initiatives by the government and NGOs.

The bench said that after the 2012 Delhi gangrape and murder, many amendments were introduced in the criminal law, redefining the ambit of offences, providing for effective and speedy investigation and trial. “Still, statistics reveal that desired results could not be achieved,” the bench observed. It said that the National Crime Records Bureau’s statistics for 2017 show 32,559 cases of rape registered across the country.

“The delay in such matters has, in recent times, created agitation, anxiety and unrest in the minds of the people,” the bench said. The court found it necessary to call for the information “to get a holistic view to make criminal justice system responsive in cases of this nature”.

Regarding registration of FIRs, the court noted that in 2013 a provision was introduced which provided that a woman police officer or any woman officer should register the case and sought to know whether all police stations have a woman police officer or woman officer to fullfill this condition.

It also asked whether an FIR without a crime number is being registered in cases where an information relating to offence of rape received at a police station reveals that the place of commission is beyond its territorial jurisdiction.

The 2013 amendment Act made a public servant’s failure to record information of any such offence as per procedure prescribed by the Code of Criminal Procedure a punishable offence. The court asked whether any public servant had so far been booked under this provision, and what mechanism is in place to complain about such failure to record information.

The bench also asked whether any advisory have been issued to hospitals and medical centres, informing them that they are duty-bound under law to provide free medical assistance to victims in such cases and to inform the police. The court wanted to know if any case had been registered, as required by law, against any hospital or medical centre for failing to comply.

Taking a grim view of some medical opinions stating that “the victim is habitual of sexual intercourse”, Wednesday’s order pointed out that the 2013 amendments had provided that such information will not be relevant to decide the question of consent and asked whether this was being followed. It also wanted to know whether the Per-Vaginum examination, commonly referred to as ‘two-finger test’, which has been held to be of no consequence and as violating the dignity of woman, has been done away with.

Stressing the importance of forensic examination in investigation, the order asked “whether there are adequate number of equipped forensic laboratories, at least one at every division level, to conduct forensic DNA and forensic odontology analysis regionally”.