Ruchika effect: Push for fast-track justice

The Centre on Tuesday said it would introduce a new law to set up fast track courts for time-bound decisions in cases of sexual offence.

The Centre on Tuesday said it would introduce a new law to set up fast track courts for time-bound decisions in cases of sexual offence.

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Facing mounting pressure from the Ruchika Girhotra molestation and suicide case, the law ministry has prepared a draft of the bill which proposes that cases of molestation, attempt to rape, rape and unnatural sex be tried in special courts, HT has learnt

The move comes a day after the home ministry said it would ask state governments to register all police complaints as FIRs.

These measures are being seen as a damage control exercise by the Centre following the public uproar on glaring loopholes in India’s justice administration system following the Ruchika case.

The proposed courts will have the powers of a sessions court, and be required to complete the trial within six months.

“The draft of the new bill is ready. We are going to send it for cabinet approval soon,” Law Minister M. Veerappa Moily told HT. “The need of the hour is to remove all existing inadequacies in the law which have agitated the public as a fallout of the Ruchika case.”

Moily said that after the cabinet nod, the ministry intends to introduce the bill in the budget session of Parliament beginning in February.

The bill — which is likely to amend the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 — is understood to be named the Sexual Offences (Special Courts) Bill.

Cases of attempt to rape, rape and unnatural sex are now tried in sessions courts. Cases of molestation are tried in courts of judicial magistrates.

“Presently, there is no time-bound trial and cases can linger on for years. The ministry wants to put an end to this,” said a senior ministry official.

Once the bill is cleared by Parliament, the Centre will take up with state governments and high courts the number of such courts required in each state.