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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Moving to the House -Upendra Baxi

Moving to the House -Upendra Baxi

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published Published on Feb 4, 2013   modified Modified on Feb 4, 2013
-The Indian Express

On the Delhi rape case, let’s keep the indignation, disturb legislative slumbers

The Verma Committee Report (VCR) speaks against civil society and political rape cultures. The poignancy and urgency of the VCR owes much to the experience of conversing with rape survivors and traumatised children. A precious message of the VCR is this: one may not take law reform seriously without taking human and social suffering equally seriously.

The committee deserved more than grudging cooperation from senior officials and bureaucrats. The government could have done more than just provide chauffeured cars to take Justice Verma and Justice Leila Seth to the inadequate offices at Vigyan Bhavan (and more often to Gopal Subramaniam’s office, where much of the work was done). Subramaniam’s generosity in facilitating the VCR remains exceptional. Yet, it is also a fact that the government fully funded the 11th-hour psychodrama that led to the national consultations of January 19 and 20. The ordinance now mercifully takes us beyond such peripheral controversies, although leading women’s groups urged the president not to sign it.

I had suggested that the government promulgate an ordinance responding to the existing legislative consensus. The VCR further suggests that its proposals, at least on the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, 2012, “ought to be promulgated by the government as an ordinance”. Progressive critique fails when it does not urge a duly elected government to apply its mind in implementing law reform measures.

The ordinance seems deferential to the VCR recommendations (some figured well before the VCR), thus recognising the offences of acid attacks, stalking and assault, voyeurism and the use of criminal force on a woman with the intent to disrobe her. It also prescribes criminal liability for employing a trafficked person. Enhanced punishment, extending up to the end of a convict’s natural life, is now recommended if rape causes death or a persistent vegetative state, as well as for rape or gangrape with grievous hurt. Reforms in the Indian Evidence Act remain crucial; they render irrelevant the character of previous sexual experiences in some cases, provide for presuming the absence of consent in certain prosecutions, outlaw questions regarding the moral character of the victim during cross-examination, and make provisions for persons with disabilities.

Why should these measures be delayed? Article 123 of the Constitution decrees that the proposed ordinance may expire around April 15, 2013, unless accepted or altered by Parliament. The president’s power to withdraw it also remains intact. In any case, standard legislative practice requires tabling a bill to further implement an ordinance. This allows the accommodation of more suggestions, whether from the standing committee or MPs.

Many feel the VCR has been “betrayed” because the ordinance fails to designate marital rape an offence, to withdraw unconstitutional impunity for rape and sexual assault by the armed forces, including the paramilitary and auxiliary forces under the control of the Central or state governments, and to enact the VCR recommendation to make superior police officials criminally liable for the actions of their subordinates. The ordinance calls for gender-neutrality, contrary to the VCR’s recommendation to define “rape” as an offence against women.

Votaries of the VCR should think beyond denunciation. Their task now lies in pushing for parliamentary time spent on considering the provisions that have been excluded. For it is easy to foresee how time will be spent in the budget session, given the BJP’s boycotting of the Union home minister, the debate on quotas for in-service promotion, the issues arising from events at the LOC and the political dissensus over the Lokpal bill.

The VCR project of going around the world in 30 days does not prohibit future timelines for its ambitious charter of reform. Even so, its failure to address deficiencies in the administration of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and the repeal of Section 377 of the IPC — a measure endorsed by Justice Seth as a member of the Law Commission of India — is inexplicable. As chair of the National Human Rights Commission, Justice Verma addressed crimes against women in the Gujarat riots. So it is astonishing that the VCR fails to address these crimes in the context of communal, caste and ethnic violence.

There is also no explanation for the VCR’s failure to accord the dignity of discourse to the protocol of investigation, with many proposing the displacement of the two-finger test. Moreover, the VCR’s effete expostulations against the extra-constitutional power of khap panchayats do not address similar fatwa cultures that inhabit state law.

Neither should the wounded citizenry be asked to await constitutional changes, such as the establishment of a CAG-type commission “auditing” the violation of women’s rights. The amendment of the rules of business in Parliament and state legislatures would serve this purpose equally well. Further, the lawyerly argument urging the presumption of innocence, even for political nominees charged with sexual assault, needs to be combated with a more sincere regard for Article 51-A, which states that it is the fundamental duty of all citizens to renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women.

Legislative measures concerning violence against women, children and sexual minorities constitute a labyrinth of piecemeal amendments to existing laws. It is time to consider putting together all such legislation in a common code. This will iron out fatal definitional inconsistencies, help regulate the wayward practices of sentencing discretion and empower officials as well as citizens.

Respect for the Delhi gangrape victim requires acts of indignation to disturb Kumbhkarna-type legislative slumber. But we must be cautious of storming the barricades and ritual government-bashing. Moving beyond our obsession with the liberal politics of law reform, we must revive the lost cause of voter education. This means demanding that our political parties commit to a timebound action programme to end rape cultures in politics and society. Otherwise, like justice hurried and harried, law reform may also be buried.

The writer is professor of law, University of Warwick, and former vice chancellor of Universities of South Gujarat and Delhi

The Indian Express, 4 February, 2013, http://www.indianexpress.com/news/moving-to-the-house/1068803/


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