Supreme Court to hear plea on redressal of wrongly prosecuted persons

Supreme Court to hear plea on redressal of wrongly prosecuted persons

Part of: Prelims and GS-II: Judiciary

Context: The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a petition highlighting the need for the government to frame guidelines for compensating victims of wrongful prosecution by the police or authorities.

The petition says

• Innocents fall victims to malice of authorities who use criminal justice system to settle scores.
• India, with a population of around 1.5 billion, has no effective statutory/legal mechanism for the wrongful prosecutions due to police and prosecutorial misconduct resulting in a pandemic of false cases which has not only destroyed the social fabric of the nation but also affected the overburdened judiciary with alarming pendency of over 40 million cases.
• The government has not yet implemented the recommendations made by the Law Commission of India in its 277th report on the miscarriage of justice in 2018.
  • The commission had prepared the report on the basis of a Delhi High Court order in the Babloo Chauhan case in November 2017 to undertake a “comprehensive examination of issue of relief and rehabilitation to victims of wrongful prosecution and incarceration”.