DATE OF JUDGEMENT: 11th March, 2021
JUDGES: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Indu Malhotra, Hon’ble Mr. Justice Ajay Rastogi
PARTIES
- Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay (Plaintiff)
- Union ministries of Home Affairs, Law and Justice and the Law Commission (Respondent)
SUBJECT: Advocate and BJP leader Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay has sought directions to the States to implement Centres Guideline for Compensation to Victims of Wrongful Prosecution and give compensation to innocent people in spirit of the recommendations of Law Commission Report No-277 on Miscarriage of Justice.
AN OVERVIEW
(i) The PIL has been filed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay in the backdrop of a sensational case in which the Allahabad High Court, on January 28, declared rape convict Vishnu Tiwari innocent, observing that the motive behind the FIR was related to a land dispute.
(ii) This shocking ordeal of the rape accused, the plea, filed through lawyer Ashwani Kumar Dubey, has alternatively urged the apex court to “use its plenary constitutional power to frame the guidelines for compensation to victims of wrongful prosecutions
(iii) Consequently, the PIL has made the Union ministries of Home Affairs, Law and Justice and the Law Commission as parties, besides all the states and UTs.
IMPORTANT PROVISIONS
Constitution Of India:
- Article 14- guarantees to all persons equality before the law and equal protection of the laws
- Article 21- No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to a procedure established by law
ISSUES
A Plea filed to the Supreme Court against “wrongful prosecution” through government machineries.
ANALYSIS OF THE JUDGEMENT
- The Plea states that “due to cases of malicious prosecution, the injury caused to the citizens is extremely large and “because of the Centre’s inaction, citizens’ right to life, liberty and dignity, guaranteed under Article 21, is being brazenly offended”
- Vide another judgment the plea says the Delhi High Court, while dealing with a plea on awarding sentences without reasoning, had expressed concerns about the wrongful implication of innocent persons who are acquitted after long years of incarceration and the lack of a legislative framework to provide relief to those who are wrongfully prosecuted.
- To quote the judgment, “The High Court, on 30.11.2017, directed the Law Commission of India to undertake a comprehensive examination of the issue of relief and rehabilitation to victims of wrongful prosecution and incarceration and the Law Commission submitted its Report No.277 on 30.8.2018 but the Centre has not taken appropriate steps to implement the recommendations,” it says.
- The plea further reiterates and says there has been a spurt in the number of false cases and wrongful prosecution and the incarceration of innocent persons with no effective statutory and legal mechanism available to them to address the same is causing “miscarriage of justice” and has created a black hole in the criminal jurisprudence in the country.
- The Petitioner further reiterates that the State is responsible for the tortuous acts of its employees and must repair the damage done to citizens by its officers, by adequate monetary compensation, and non-monetary compensation when deemed fit.
- After factual checking according to the petitioner, till the amendments are done, it is the need of hour to have a specific guidelines and for the State and its agencies to prevent such police and prosecutorial misconduct which is rampantly destroying lives of innocents who are falsely implicated and then acquitted after years of turmoil in the guise of "prosecution could not prove beyond doubt" and never served justice due to disdainful approach of State which is a f actor for pendency of over 40 million cases.
CONCLUSION
In this Plea, it reads that “false cases led to suicides of innocents who are victims of police and prosecutorial misconduct, who lose hope and lives of their families destroyed after years of delayed trials due to the non-effective machinery which only gets aggravated by denial or reluctance of taking penal actions in a routine manner by the Courts against misconduct of investigating officers and vexatious complainants, mostly under the guile of absence of malice and defense of mistake done in good faith which leads to miscarriage of justice."
The plea has further reiterated the Blackstone's principle which stated that "better that ten guilty person's escape, than one innocent suffer". In addition to that, the plea further cited Supreme Court's order in the case of Maulad Ahmed v. State of Uttar Pradesh, where it had observed that “If a police officer manipulates the record such as police diary etc., it will be the end of honest investigation; and, such offences shall receive deterrent punishment which is under Section 218 IPC"
