DailyPost 2769
SUSPECT CRIMINAL CASE LIFECYCLE (1)
If the system is flawed, broken or of low quality, efforts can be made to set it right but if it is suspect, then the likelihood of change becomes next to impossible. The ultimate truth is how many critical stakeholders desperately want this change, and if not only by lip service, then what has been their desperate efforts to set themselves right first and second the parts of criminal justice that could possibly impact. The first milestone in the lifecycle is the registration of the case. What cases would be registered and what cannot be registered in known today to the people at large and probable reasons too.
While police do not have any discretion in the registration of a case, in practice not only does discretion operate in full sway, it has today become a matter of prerogative. The second milestone in the same process are cases that can be taken cognizance of Suo motto. If you see the world around you, how many of criminal acts which are fully known in public domain, have not been taken cognizance of by police, courts and other agencies vested with such powers? Has law given them the right to pick up cases on their whims and fancy? Does it not make the initiation of the case suspect itself?
Does it also not make the whole environment suspect for the criminal justice system to operate fairly, given the state of affairs at the first and second milestones of the registration of the case itself. Even worse, the third milestone instance, when the case does not get registered even after agitations, sometimes even in the national capital after a long-drawn agitation at a prominent location. The Supreme Court was moved to intervene and then the case was registered. The fourth milestone scenario is when there is a battle regarding the jurisdiction of two police stations and the victim / relatives are put in unimaginable trauma only for the case to be registered.
The fifth scenario, which we keep debating from the top of the houses every day, is that wrong sections of the law and uncalled for laws / sections are added. The ingredients of the sections are thrown to the winds. Draconian laws are put into action for flimsiest of the offences or at times for created offences. You give me the person and I will give you the law. Today, a narrative decides the application of sections. If a narrative supersedes facts and that too criminal acts / offences, then where are we heading to?
ARE WE MOVING FROM TAKING COGNIZANCE OF AN OFFENCE TO CRIME FICTION?
Sanjay Sahay
Have a nice evening.