This article is written by Janvi Babbar, from Bharti Vidyapeeth University.
Table of Contents
Introduction
To understand the delay in the criminal justice system, it is important to first understand the nature of crime and most importantly penal laws because criminal law is based on penal laws. The main question is why are penal laws made? Personal safety[i], Security of liberty and property, is of the utmost importance to every individual. Maintenance of peace and order is essential in any society for human beings to live peacefully without any injury to their lives, limbs and property.
This is possible only in states where penal law is effective and strong enough to deal with violators of law. Any state, whatever might be its ideology or form of government, in order to be designated as a state, should certainly have an efficient system of penal laws in order to discharge its primary function of keeping peace in the land by maintaining law and order. The instrument by which this paramount duty is laid by the government is undoubtedly the penal law of the land. The penal law is an effective instrument of social control. Its approach is condemnatory and as it authorises the state to inflict punishment. If the state needs to criminalise a certain kind of conduct is to declare that it should not be done, by instituting a punishment.
Nevertheless, those who still perform crime after being aware of the punishment, then the penal law comes into play by punishing the accused based on statutes. The punishment of the accused is determined based on both law as well as facts of the matter. It, therefore, defines and punishes ‘acts’ or ‘omissions’ that are perceived as:
- Attacks on public order, internal or external;
- Abuse or obstruction of public authority;
- Act injurious to public in general;
- Attacks upon the person of individuals, or upon rights annexed to their persons; or
- Attacks on the property of individuals or rights connected with or similar to that of property rights.
Foundation of criminal justice system
- Law enforcement agencies, usually the police;
- Courts and accompanying prosecution and defence advocates; and
- Agencies of detaining and supervising offenders, such as prisoners and prohibition agencies[ii].
These distinct fields operate together as the principle means of maintaining the rules of law in the society, so that people have faith in the criminal justice system of India. The basic principle on which the criminal justice system works is based on assurance of fair trial. The main objective of criminal trial is to provide the aggrieved with absolute justice, so that individuals of the society do not question the law and order of their country.
Present situation of justice system in India
As per the law minister Shri. Ravi Prasad, in a written statement claims that there are 43 lakh pending cases in 25 High courts. Out of which 18.75 lakh are civil matters and 12.15 lakh are criminal matters. 8 lakh cases are over a decade old, 26.76 lakh cases less than 5 years old, 8.44 cases are pending more than 5 years but less than 10 years, 8.35 lakh cases are pending from over 10 years. There are 1,58,669 lakh cases pending in the Supreme Court of India. Therefore, a total of 3.5 crore cases are pending in the Indian courts.[iii]
Main reasons for the increase in the number of cases:
- Public awareness about the legal provisions, through media, social networking etc.;
- Increases in literacy rate;
- Public interest litigation;
- Right to Information Act (RTI); and
- Increased percentage of crime against women.
How politics influence crime in India?
In the recent assembly elections, Delhi elected 43 MLAs facing criminal cases[iv], 26 of them won against the runner up with a “clean background”. 13 out of the 43 have criminal cases against women, out of 13 had a matter related to rape. If these kinds of candidates, who already have criminal history but still participate in elections and win the elections. This will certainly affect the law and order and the citizens will be less likely to have faith in the justice system. This may even cause an increased number of criminal cases.
Primordial reasons of delay in the criminal justice system according to statute
The criminal law in India is based on the principle that even through wrong acquittal[v] should be avoided but there should not be any wrongful conviction of an innocent person. Hence, the accused is given multiple opportunities to defend themselves.
In some cases police fails to register an FIR[vi] and collect evidence from the crime scene this also delays the trial process.
The statutes such as Code of Criminal procedure, constitution of India, Supreme Court rules, etc. have a number of remedies, to defend the accused and prevent the infringement of fundamental right which is Art.21 (right to liberty) stated in the constitution of India. This article also assures speedy trial[vii]. As, the defendant can file a review petition in the court if he is not satisfied with the order passed, if that gets dismissed he can change the jurisdiction of the court, by moving the jurisdiction of a higher court.
If the review petition[viii] gets canceled in the High court then the defendant can move to the jurisdiction of the Supreme court by exercising the power of Art. 32 by filing a SLP (special leave petition) under Art. 136[ix], even if the SLP gets dismissed which happens almost in 80% of the cases, then also the defendant can file a review petition in the SC. Lastly, if the review petition gets rejected, then the defendant can file a curative petition[x] under the Supreme Court rules Act, 2013. All these provisions are mentioned in the statute to give a fair chance to the accused person, so that he may defend himself. In certain cases, such as when a death sentence is awarded to an accused person. Then that accused person can even exercise the power of Art.72 (power of president to grant pardons) and Art. 161 (power of a governor of a state of union territory to grant pardons or to suspend, remit, or commute sentence in certain cases) of the constitution of India[xi]. Hence, all the aforesaid processes are time consuming and need a number of hearings and all the required evidence to pass an order.
Other important reasons for delay in criminal justice system
India has a low judge:people ratio, as there are 20 judges per 10 lakh people and number of cases pending are 3.5 crore. One of the prima facie reasons that we are not able to contain the ever-growing pendency of cases is due to the shortage of high court judges. At present 399 posts, or 37% of sanctioned judge strength, are vacant. “The existing vacancies need to be filled immediately. However, despite best efforts put in by all the stakeholders, it has not been possible to appoint judges to bring the working judge-strength anywhere close to the sanctioned judge- strength,” Wrote by ex-CJI of India Shri Ranjan Gogoi[xii].
The HC’s remaining justices take long vacations. This causes inefficiency in the justice system. Young budding lawyers don’t look up to judiciary as a career because judges are paid low and young lawyers find litigation as a more fulfilling and promising career. The disposal rate of cases has stayed between 55% to 59% in the Supreme Court of India, 28% at The High Courts, and 40% in the subordinate courts.
- There are not sufficient numbers of courts.
- Indian judiciary has insufficient resources both centre and state, budget allocation for judiciary is just 0.1%-0.2%.
- There is too much litigation from the government side, most of the time the government side fails to prove their point.
- Low judicial equality courts.
- Less skilled judges at the lower courts.
Due to all the aforesaid factors there is delay in the criminal justice system in India.
Suggestions for an efficient justice system in India
- The vacancies of judges should be filled.
- More skilled judges should be recruited for the district courts.
- Judges should be paid well.
- Judges of the High Court should get less vacations to maintain the efficiency of the justice system.
- Young lawyers should also consider judiciary as a career.
- Budget allocation for the judiciary should be increased.
- For speedy trial, the compounding method can be applied to few provisions mentioned u/s 321 Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
Conclusion
Towards the end, the research put in the paper suggests that law students and lawyers should also consider judiciary as a career. The salary of judges should be increased. The budget allocation for the judiciary should be increased. High court judges should spend less time on vacations.
Police should work more efficiently by registering an FIR on time, starting with investigation on time so that no evidence gets destroyed. The criminal offences which come u/s 321 of the code of criminal procedure should be solved by compounding method, if the parties are ready for a settlement because in this case the accused admits his/her offence. These methods will definitely increase the efficiency of the criminal justice system in India. As, delays in criminal cases are ugly pox marks on our justice system. Therefore, they should be removed by taking suitable actions.
Hence, justice delayed is justice denied; but equally, justice hurried is justice buried.
References
[i] PSA Pillai’s, Criminal Law 13 (2017).
[ii] Strayer University, U.S. Criminal Law Justice System, Intro to American Justice System (20 Jan 2020), https://www.correctionaloffice.org/.
[iii] The Economic Times, 43 lakh cases pending in the High Court, Politics National(Jun 27 2019), https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/out-of-43-lakh-cases-pending-in-high-courts-over-8-lakh-a-decade-old/articleshow/69974916.cms.
[iv] The Economic Times, Delhi elected 26 MLA’s facing Criminal cases, Politics Nation(Mar 25 2020).
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics -and-nation/delhi-elected-26-mlas-facing criminal-cases-over-candidates-with-clean-backgroud adr/articleshow/74811638.cms.
[v] Code of Criminal Procedure, Universal’s, Sec.248-255, 1973, (34 of 2019).
[vi] Lalita Kumari v. Govt.of U.P.,(2013), SCC 1515.
[vii] Pankaj Kumar v. State of Maharshtra, (2008) 16 SCC 117,(para 22 and 23).
[viii] B.I.S.N.Co. v. Jasjit Singh, (1965) (1) SCC 425 (428).
[ix] Municipal Board, Pratapgarh v. Mahendra Singh Chawla, (1982) (3) SCC 331.
[x] Rupa Ashok Hurra v. Ashok Hurra, (2002) (4) SCC 388, 2002 SC 1771.
[xi] Mukho Mandal v. State of Bihar, (1955) (1) PLJR 148.
[xii] Gautam Bhatia, The Wire, CJI’s Opinion on Judiciary (Mar 16 2019) https://thewire.in/law/chief-justice-ranjan-gogoi-legacy/.
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