New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday expressed concern over the “alarming rise” in the cases of child rape across the country noting that in first six months of current year, 24,000 cases involving child abuse were registered across the country.
Appointing senior counsel V. Giri as amicus curiae to assist the court in the hearing of the matter, the bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice Deepak Gupta and Justice Aniruddha Bose decided to address the issue of alarming rise in the cases of child rape based on media reports and portals.
The court asked Mr Giri to assist the court in issuing directions to the states for putting in place infrastructure for the holding of trials of such cases, including setting up of SIT for the investigation of cases.
The court said that in first six months of the current year, 24,000 cases of child rape have come to light and 12,000 cases are still under investigation and the trial has not commenced in 50% of the cases. It noted that the trial has ended only in 900 cases.
Directing the hearing of the matter on July 15, the court said it would be assisted by the amicus V. Giri and solicitor-general Tushar Mehta. The court said no intervention would be allowed in the matter.
The court directed its registry to file the case as writ petition with cause title “In-re Alarming Rise in The Number of Reported Child Rape Incidents”
It also directed the registry to submit report on the total number of cases of child rape since January 1, 2019 across the country, stage of their investigation and the time being taken to file the charge-sheet, including the status of trial.
