Essay on Safeguarding Victim’s Rights through Legal Reforms in India.
Ever since the adoption of the Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice, for victims of Power Abuse and Crime in 1985, considerable progress has been made by many nations including India, to provide assistance to victims of crime. However, there has been general lack of support services and counselling as a legal measure for the crime victims and whatever assistance is provided to them, it is more or less in the form of family support or reimbursement of medical treatment expenses or litigation costs etc.
Therefore, it has to be admitted that this vital issue has not received the attention of criminal law administers, which it deserves, and there is general lack of adequate policies sensitive to victims. It may be because of the lack of sense of commitment or want of political will to ameliorate the woes and problems of victims of crime.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
There is need to mobilise public opinion and sensitise criminal justice administrators to persuade the Government and law-makers to provide a comprehensive legal framework for assistance and compensatory relief to victims on the lines suggested by the World Society of Victimology and the United Nations in its handbook on ‘Justice for Victims’.
The legislative policy and law reform on victim’s Redressal and their assistance should be based on certain fundamental principles which are as follows:—
1. Victims of crime deserve respect for their dignity, privacy and personal liberty;
2. Victims need assistance and support to cope with the aftermath of their victimization and their alienation from the society should be prevented;
ADVERTISEMENTS:
3. The costs of policing, criminal justice, corrective measure and of course, the reparation for loss of property or injury to person including medical treatment cost etc. should be recoverable by the victim from the offender or the state or from both;
4. Victim being the first hand witness and the main source of information about crime and criminal, his version (statement) is of crucial importance for police, prosecutors and courts. Therefore, the testimony of victims should be properly weighed and evaluated and not easily discarded;
5. While accepting the plea bargaining under section 265-A of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the claims of victim(s) should not be ignored in an anxiety to dispose of the case promptly;
6. The constitutional and human rights of the victim of crime should be legally safeguarded.