New Delhi: In a landmark order, a Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi has directed every district with more than 100 cases under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) to set up exclusive courts which would try only such cases.
The order came in a case taken up by the court on its own (suo motu), owing to concern about the increasing instances of child rapes. It directed that the exclusive courts be set up under a central scheme, as the central government had recently announced that it would establish 1,023 special fast-track courts to try cases under POCSO, but those courts were also saddled with rape cases.
The Supreme Court has given the Centre 60 days to start the courts, telling Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the government, that it “has to make money available for this”.
The matter has been posted for further hearing on 26 September, but the Centre has been directed to update the court on progress within four weeks.
Massive issue
On 16 July, the Supreme Court had asked senior advocate V. Giri to get data from all high courts and suggest ways to improve investigation and clear the backlog of POCSO cases pending trial.
Submitting his status report, Giri had said the architecture of juvenile courts was different from regular courts in how the accused and the victim child, who is accompanied by a support person, are separated. Giri had submitted that there was a need to sensitise judges and prosecutors dealing with such cases.
The court had also appointed registrar S.S. Rathi to coordinate with high courts for the data. This was done to ascertain the correct position of cases relating to POCSO.
The SC registrar submitted that 1.5 lakh POCSO cases were pending adjudication, with Uttar Pradesh being the worst offender with over 44,000 pending cases since November 2012. Maharashtra is second with over 19,000 pending cases.
‘More interested in Tripura, Odisha than Delhi’
While noting the infrastructural challenges in setting up POCSO-exclusive courts, CJI Gogoi observed that courts still use curtains to keep the victim and accused apart.
“There is usually just a curtain dividing the accused and victim in such courts where the victim is questioned by the Special Public Prosecutor. When Parliament passed the POCSO legislation, a lot of statements were made to the media. But there is nothing happening,” he said.
When the central government informed the court that there two child exclusive courts in Delhi’s Saket, the CJI retorted by saying that the court was more interested in “Tripura, Odisha and other states”.
The court also directed support persons for child victims to be “oriented to child rights” and “child friendly”. Currently, support persons need to hold a bachelor’s or master’s degree in social work, and then undergo training at district legal services institutes before being appointed.
Giri also requested the court to have exclusive forensic labs for POCSO cases in each district, as there was usually a delay of six to eight months in filing such a report. The CJI-led bench has reserved the matter for a later date, instead directing chief secretaries of states to ensure that the forensic labs act efficiently in POCSO cases.
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