Top court seeks data from HCs on child rape cases

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday expressed concern at appallingly low rate of the conclusion of trials in child rape cases, noting that in Delhi alone of 729 cases that were registered since January 1, this year only two cases have been disposed off out of 170 cases in which trial is in progress.

“If this is happening in the national capital which has a state-of-art courts, then what is the situation in other states”, observed chief justice Ranjan Gogoi, who along with Justice Deepak Gupta, is hearing the matter relating to an alarming increase in the cases of child rape across the country.

The court has taken a suo motu cognisance of the spurt in the number of child rape cases across the country. In the first six months of the current year since January 1, 24,2123 cases have been registered and investigation is underway in only 49 per cent of these cases.

To have a stock of the overall situation, ever since law to protect the children from sexual abuse law was enacted in 2012, the court on Monday directed its registry to call for information from the high courts on the number of cases registered, investigated and the status of their trials in each district.

Giving 10 days time to collect the information, court fixed July 25 as next date of hearing.

The court sought information as it was told that except for one case in Rajasthan where the trial under POCSO was completed in four days and judgment pronounced in five days thereafter, in most of the cases the mandate of law to protect children from sexual abuse was not complied with.

Noting that in most of the cases the existing special courts were being given additional charge of POCSO cases, amicus curiae V.Giri told the court under the POCSO Act there has to be separate courts dedicated to child rape case with judges and the special public prosecutor sensitive to the issue.

Justice Gupta said that he has problem with POCSO courts being located in the existing court complexes saying that they should be located somewhere outside.

“I have problem with these courts. Special courts have to be outside it” Justice Gupta said pointing a solitary instance in Andhra Pradesh where these courts are located separately.

Justice Gupta’s observation came as Mr Giri sought structural changes in the court rooms to make victim children comfortable so that they don’t see anything detracting them.