Solutions to rising crimes against women & children.

The recent report by Praja highlights what has been suspected all along that crimes against women & children are treated casually.. This explains the fact, that, more than 90% cases are pending trials in courts.

Hence, conviction is less than 40 % .The reasons can be many. One major reason is shortage of manpower or rather human power. The highest shortage is in forensic laboratories where its 40%, followed by public prosecutors where its 28% shortage. Next is the police, where shortage of personnel is 18% & in sessions courts, the shortage is 14% .Even the Supreme Court & High Courts have vacancies & it takes years to fill up the vacancies. Obviously, all this affects deliverance of justice .And ,when ,at the grassroot level, there are vacancies at sessions courts, & amongst the police, the public prosecutors, & in the forensic laboratories, women & children continue to suffer as their lives are marred by violence.

Even in cases that needed to be tried under the Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences ( POCSO) Act ,just about half of the cases have been tried in special courts as mandated under the POCSO  act. And only 44 out of a total 220 cases tried under POCSO reached the stage of judgement in 2019. In, 2020 , because of COVID, the situation has definitely worsened. All this will add to a huge backlog of cases in the future.

As per the National Judicial Data Grid ,the backlog of cases is a whooping 37.7 million ! This works out to 3.7 million cases pending for 10 years, Out of these 3.7 million cases, 2.8 million cases before the district courts & 0.92 million cases before the High Courts have remained pending. And that’s not all. Nearly, 6,60,000 cases have remained pending for more than two decades & another, 1,31,000 have remained unresolved for more than 30 years. All this adds to a huge economic cost. Moreover, delay in justice is as good as denial of justice.

Capital punishment or death penalty is an incorrect response to check crimes against women & children. Capital punishment is not a deterrent .It is an expensive process & since nearly 75 % of the accused on the death row are from the marginalised sections of society, it gets too exorbitant .And death penalty has not acted as a deterrent .If death penalty is the answer then murders should have stopped. And yet, murders continue. Capital punishment is like revenge & this has therefore no place in a civil society. And cases in which capital punishment is awarded take years to end. And this makes it a long & winding process. It is traumatic for the victim, their families & even for the accused & their families. .And where is the scope to correct if a person is given capital punishment & later its discovered that the accused who suffered the death penalty ,had not committed the alleged crime ?

Many states have brought in the death penalty in case of sexual assaults' of children below 12 years under POCSO. And the effect is ,that there are hardly any convictions. Because ,in most cases of sexual abuse of children , the accused   ( more than  90% ) are from the family and friends. And so the victim or survivor is pressurized to keep silent & not depose against the accused.

The pandemic has led to an exponential increase in cases of domestic violence .And even in such cases, it is  likely that the women who are the victims and survivors , will choose to remain silent .They would rather not speak up against their family members. So death penalty will make this complaining against family members nearly impossible.

Faster arrests , thorough investigation & fast tracking of cases  is needed to curb rising crimes against women & children. 

How can the pendency of cases involving women & kids be  brought down ? Obviously by decisions of the courts .And that can happen only when the courts function with full capacity. That means all vacancies need to be filled up. And this should include vacancies at the levels of judiciary, at the level of police , at the level of public prosecutors and also at the level of forensic laboratories. It's the entire gamut of the judicial system that needs to be covered.

Another step that needs to be taken is to fill up all the vacancies that exist across all the courts, from  the lowest till the highest levels. This will improve the judge to population ratio & help in brining down the backlog of cases. The Advocate General of India, Mr Venugopal recently told the Supreme Court that there is a lot of gender bias in the judiciary .He opined that as many as 50 % of judges need to be women to make it non biased.

A suggestion is to temporarily increase the number of lower courts by appointing willing law graduates as judges .Such temporary judges will be paid only salary .They will be ineligible for other benefits .And as soon as the backlog of cases end, these temporary  judges will be retired without any benefits. Of course, the most suitable of them can be absorbed into the judicial services after the requisite examinations & interviews & other relevant criteria. And mostly these temporary judges can be from women candidates. Even the courts which have to try POCSO cases can be headed majorly by women. Because women have a better understanding of children & their trauma. The temporary judges can try a majority of the cases dealing with women & children as women are better equipped to deal with such cases.

The Supreme Court guidelines as laid down in the Vishaka case  ( which dealt with sexual harassment at the workplace ) stated that the internal complaints committee in any organisation must be headed by  a woman .At least half of the members of this committee must be women. It follows therefore that women must have an equally importantly role to play in violent crimes affecting women & children

Similarly, other temporary posts can be created across the entire gamut of the criminal justice system whereby police personnel, the public prosecutors, the forensic team, can be majorly women. And these temporary posts can be ended once the pendency of cases gets back to manageable proportions. Here also, the most suitable ones can be absorbed into the permanent services through examinations, interviews & other relevant criteria. The Constitution of India allows reservation in favour of women & hence these judicial, police , public prosecution & forensic science jobs in favour of women are as per the Fundamental Right under Article 15 ( 3 ). 

Another  way to reduce the huge backlog of cases is to allow  the courts & other judicial & quasi judicial authorities to work in shifts.  In Maharashtra, the lower courts will be working in two shifts .And this, is indeed, the urgent need of the day. In fact, not just the lower courts, even the High Courts & Supreme Court need to work in shifts to clear the huge backlog of cases. If this happens, the backlog will end soon & then all courts can resume single shift working.

And as women get employed , the GDP of our country will rise by 27 % .Hence, employing women as judges, police personnel, public prosecutors & forensic scientists will be a WIN WIN situation for all !!! It will make the society safer for women & children as crimes are dealt with promptly & justice is delivered. Economy will improve & the backlog of cases will reduce.

And this is in accordance with India’s position on the international stage. India is signatory to the International Covenant on Civil & Political rights as also Convention for Elimination of Discrimination against Women .

And this pandemic has given us a chance to implement the aforesaid ideas ,  which can only lead us ahead in the direction of a better tomorrow !

Women & the four pillars of Justice.

This blog post was published as a featured post on Women's Web. Featured Posts are a careful selection of highly relevant and interesting posts picked by  editors @Women's Web .each day


The Times of India dated 7th of November, 2019 published a study  " Litigants lose nearly ₹ 50,000 crore annually in  India " .The report went on to say that all states & Union Territories s spend less than 1% of GDP on judiciary .Delhi is the only state which spends 1.9 % of GDP on judiciary. The average for India works out  to 0.8% of GDP on judiciary. The score by the states on the four pillars of justice namely legal aid, judiciary, police & prison is equally pathetic.

The represenation of women in judiciary is slightly more than one fourth, at 26.5 % whereas in the police it is merely 7 % & for prisons, it is slightly better at 10 % .Because the number of women lawyers is less, the empanelment of women is even lesser. Only  Tamil Nadu ,which had a good number of women in the judiciary & police,  came out on top in diversity. Diversity helps the cause of justice. 

The India Justice Report , 2019  says that vacancies in police, prison & judiciary is the main cause of delay in justice. And denial of justice over long periods  leads to economic  loss & may lead to social unrest & instability . Prisons are overcrowded except jails for women. Legal aid looks like a cruel joke  as it is pegged at only 75 paise on a per capita basis every year.

Women are caregivers & caretakers .So its better to utilise them in areas such as prison reforms & even in police & the judiciary.Women are the sensitised lot & are more responsive  than men in cases of rapes of women, children, etc.Even today , the POSCO act is rarely invoked to punish the accused in the cases of child rapes. This would change ,if women are in charge . So, the need of the times, is more women in the workforce. A beginning ,can be made by increasing the number of women in the lower strata of the police, prisons & the judiciary. Over time, these ladies from the lowest ranks can move to higher ranks in the respective fields . Since women are less in the work force , appointing them at the higher levels without relevant experience would seem unfair & may be unworkable. 

The percentage of women in the workforce is less than 25 %.There are many reasons .One is patriarchy as women are supposed to manage home & hearth. Safety is another factor .And because, there are few women in work force , there is lot of gender disparity in  wages, in both informal  as also the formal workforce. 

Hence ,more women need to be brought into the work force. And they need to do paid work not housework. This will increase India's GDP by 20 % as per one estimate .

In another study by two Harvard students, it was found ,that more women in workplace would lead to a rise of nearly 27 % in the GDP of India. There is lot of discrimination which happens during hiring ,over qualifications, experience, etc. So the need is to increase gender diversity, to get more women into doing paid  work.

Unfortunately, in India, the women are leaving paid work & sitting at home taking care of family & housework. This ,in spite of higher GDP & higher employment .As women  get better educated & get married into higher income families, they give up paid work because of socio cultural reasons. The Government wants women to take an increased role in the armed forces & yet ,there's lot of resistance. A silver lining has been the commissioning of flight commander S. Dhami as Flight Commander in the officer cadre .Lieutenant Commander Karabi Gogoi has been selected as the Assistant Naval Attache at Russia. She is a naval engineer & at present is posted at Karwar naval base, Karnataka.Lets trust, this the beginning ,of a long line of female officers in the Armed  Forces. 

Similarly, government should enforce that more women are at work in the police, prisons & the judiciary  .Though private companies can do their bit in hiring more women , government can set the finest example, by making it easy, to hire women.  Women in correctional services & law & order services would lead to better safety environment for all ,especially for women, children & the elderly. And hence ,better law & order promoting peace. As the number of women increase in the judiciary, the police &  the prisons, legal aid  will get utilised to help the underdogs . This will lead to amore equitable society.  This will lead to stability, in which India can prosper faster, leading to better living conditions for all .

Since vacancies in judiciary are more at lower rungs,as high as 52 % in Mizoram  it would suffice if women are employed on contactual terms initially .This would ease burden on the exchequer .Because shortly & surely, women would  set up such a high bar that there they would earn their place/ s in the aforesaid services .And the number of judges at subordinate courts need to rise too .In India, there is one judge for 50,000 people. This needs to improve. So more judges are needed at subordinate courts .And the courts need to work in shifts ,as there are lakhs of cases pending in courts .This shift working will help clear the backlog of pending cases. This will help in employing more women as well.

.Just like in the local self governments, there is reservations for women , even at lower rungs in judiciary, police & prisons, 50 percent  or more jobs  can be reserved for women .This is allowed by Indian constitution under Fundamental Rights.Article 15 ( 3 ) of the Constitution allows reservation in favour of women.Moreover, India is a signatory to the Convention for Elimination of Dicrimination Against  Women . India has also signed the International Covenant on Civil & Political Rights .

The women need to have a bachelor's degree in law .With this basic degree , they can dispense justice at lower rungs with some basic training thrown in. A similar plan can be drawn up to employ more women  in the police & prison services. The best among the women so employed, must be given chances to rise up in the services. Soon, there will be more & more women breaking the glass ceilings. Obviously, the percentage rise in India's GDP will the cream on the cake !

And as more women participate in the labour market by doing paid work, gender parity in wages will become better & better. And  gender equality will lead to better family life, less stress, better health & a society that has does not judge on masculanity.In short, better living conditions for all !