Administration of the Criminal Justice System in India

4696 words (19 pages) Law Essay

6th Aug 2019 Administrative Law Reference this
Tags: Indian law
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Introduction
The essential object of criminal law is to protect society against criminals and law-
breakers. For this purpose the law holds out threats of punishments to prospective
lawbreakers as well as attempts to make the actual offenders suffer the prescribed
punishments for their crimes. Therefore, criminal law, in its wider sense, consists of
both the substantive criminal law and the procedural (or adjective) criminal law.
Substantive criminal law defines offences and prescribes punishments for the same,
while the procedural law administers the substantive law.
Therefore the two main statues which deals with administration of criminal cases in
our country are criminal procedure code i.e. Crpc and Indian penal code i.e. Ipc being
procedural and substantive respectively. However with the changing times the
societal norms also change and people who are part of this society have to accept this
change either by way of compromise or any other way in order to adjust and make
them still the part of the very same society. In earlier days there was no criminal law
in uncivilized society. Every man was liable to be attacked in his person or property
at any time by any one. The person attacked either succumbed or over-powered his
opponent. “A tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye, a life for a life” was the forerunner
of criminal justice [1]. As time advanced, the injured person agreed to accept
compensation, instead of killing his adversary. Subsequently, a sliding scale came
into existence for satisfying ordinary offences. Such a system gave birth to archaic
criminal law.
For a long time, the application of these principles remained with the parties
themselves, but gradually this function came to be performed by the State. The germs
of criminal jurisprudence came into existence in India from the time of Manu. In the
category of crimes Manu has recognized assault, theft, robbery, false evidence,
slander, criminal breach of trust, cheating, adultery and rape. The king protected his
subjects and the subjects in return owed him allegiance and paid him revenue. The
king administered justice himself, and, if busy, the matter was entrusted to a Judge. If
a criminal was fined, the fine went to the king’s treasury, and was not given as
compensation to the injured party. [2]
Later with the advent of western jurisprudence and passing of various charters and
commissions and the advent of British rule the Indian society succumbed or we can
probably say adjusted or adapted and aligned itself to the adversarial system of justice
dispensation which prevails even today but with a lot of changes which have been
time and again being made to it to suit to the needs of the changing times. In today’s
world one needs to have a receptive, broad and open mind in order to solve various
problems which are discussed in chapter one being faced by our justice system. Since
it is evident that a change is required in our criminal justice system and there is a need
to adhere to recourse to alternative methods of dispute resolution even in criminal
cases instead of making a major change we firstly have to see the common features of
a trial and the procedure which is followed by our courts or system for the
administration of criminal justice and its flaws which is discussed as further. [3]
At the outset of this chapter the researcher would like to state that owing to paucity of
time and nature of topic selected the researcher has limited his scope of study to a
certain specific offences only and would be dealing with them and the lacuna which
exists in the administration procedure followed and which particular technique of
ADR can be used to curb the said problems and side by side would result in a fair and
expeditious trial.
Procedure for Administration of Criminal Justice
The procedure of administration of criminal justice in our country is divided into
three stages namely investigation, inquiry and trial. The Criminal procedure code
1973 provides for the procedure to be followed in investigation, inquiry and trial, for
every offence under the Indian Penal Code or under any other law. Now before
discussing the procedure of administration there are certain basic terms one should be
aware of these being;
Cognizable offences.
Non cognizable offences.
Inquiry.
Investigation.
Section 2(c) of the Code defines ‘Cognizable Offence’ and ‘Cognizable case’ as
follows: –
“Cognizable Offence” means an offence means an offence for which, and
“Cognizable case” means a case in which, a police officer may, in accordance with
the First Schedule or under any other law for the time being in force, arrest without
warrant”.
Whereas section 2(l) defines “Non-cognizable offence” means an offence for which,
and “non-cognizable case” means a case in which, a police officer has no authority
to arrest without warrant”
Section 2 (g) defines “Inquiry” means every inquiry, other than a trial, conducted
under this Code by a Magistrate or court; and section 2 (h) defines “Investigation”
includes all the proceedings under this Code for the collection of evidence conducted
by a police officer or by any person (other than a Magistrate) who is authorized by a
Magistrate in this behalf,
Therefore for a dispute to be resolved the said case has to go through the three stages
i.e. inquiry investigation and trial and after this process is completed the judgement of
the court is passed by the judge who decides the case and its outcome. Although the
said process appears to simple and plain on paper but in practicality is cumbersome
and time consuming which is defeating the main essence of a criminal system i.e. fair
and expeditious justice and hence warrants a change now.
The three stages: namely investigation, inquiry and trial are as follows
Investigation is a preliminary stage conducted by the police and usually starts after
the recording of a First Information Report (FIR) in the police station. Section
154 [4] provides that any information received in the police station in respect of a
cognizable offence shall be reduced into writing, got signed by the informant and
entered in the concerned register. Section 156(1) requires the concerned officer to
investigate the facts and circumstances of such a case without any order from the
Magistrate in this behalf. If Magistrate receives information about commission of a
cognizable offence he can order an investigation. In such cases citizen is spared the
trouble and expense of investigating and prosecuting the case.
Section 157 [5] of the code provides for the procedure for investigation which is as; if
the officer-in-charge of a police station suspects the commission of an offence, from
statement of FIR or when the magistrate directs or otherwise, the officer or any
subordinate officer is duty-bound to proceed to the spot to investigate facts and
circumstances of the case and if necessary, takes measures for the discovery and
arrest of the offender. It primarily consists of ascertaining facts and circumstances of
the case, includes all the efforts of a police officer for collection of evidence:
proceeding to the spot; ascertaining facts and circumstances; discovery and arrest of
the suspected offender; collection of evidence relating to the commission of offence,
which may consist of the examination of various persons including the
accused [6] and taking of their statements in writing and the search of places or
seizure of things considered necessary for the investigation and to be produced at the
trial; formation of opinion as to whether on the basis of the material collected there is
a case to place the accused before a magistrate for trial and if so, taking the necessary
steps for filing the charge-sheet. The investigation procedure ends with a submission
of a police report to the magistrate under section 173 of the code this report is
basically a conclusion which an investigation officer draws on the basis of evidence
collected.
Now the second phase is, Inquiry dealt under sections 177-189 of the code which
consists of a magistrate, either on receiving a police report or upon a complaint by
any other person, being satisfied of the facts. Lastly, the third stage is trial. Trial is the
judicial adjudication of a person’s guilt or innocence. Under the Crpc, criminal trials
have been categorized into three divisions having different procedures, called
warrant, summons and summary trials.
Section 2(x) of the Crpc defines Warrant-case i.e. “Warrant-case” means a case
relating to an offence punishable with death, imprisonment for life or imprisonment
for a term exceeding two years; A warrant case relates to offences punishable with
death, imprisonment for life or imprisonment for a term exceeding two years. Trial of
warrant cases is dealt under sections 238-250 of the code.
The Crpc provides for two types of procedure for the trial of warrant cases i.e. By a
magistrate, triable by a magistrate, viz., those instituted upon a police report and those
instituted upon complaint. In respect of cases instituted on police report, it provides
for the magistrate to discharge the accused upon consideration of the police report
and documents sent with it. In respect of the cases instituted otherwise than on police
report, the magistrate hears the prosecution and takes the evidence. If there is no case,
the accused is discharged. If the accused is not discharged, the magistrate holds
regular trial after framing the charge, etc. In respect of offences punishable with
death, life imprisonment or imprisonment for a term exceeding seven years, the trial
is conducted in a session’s court after being committed or forwarded to the court by a
magistrate.
A summons case means a case relating to an offence not being a warrant case,
implying all cases relating to offences punishable with imprisonment not exceeding
two years. In respect of summons cases, there is no need to frame a charge. The court
gives substance of the accusation, which is called “notice”, to the accused when the
person appears in pursuance to the summons. The court has the power to convert a
summons case into a warrant case, if the magistrate thinks that it is in the interest of
justice. The provisions regarding the procedure to be followed in summons case is
dealt under section 251-259 of the Crpc.
Summary trials are dealt under section 260 – 265 of the Crpc the procedure is as
provided; the high court may empower magistrates of first class to try certain
offences in a summary way where as second class magistrates can summarily try an
offence only if it is punishable only with a fine or imprisonment for a term not
exceeding six months. In a summary trial no sentence of imprisonment for a term
exceeding three months can be passed in any conviction. The particulars of the
summary trial are entered in the record of the court and in every case which is tried
summarily in which the accused does not plead guilty the magistrate records the
substance of the evidence and a judgment containing a brief statement of the reasons
for the finding.
The common features of the trials in all three of the aforementioned procedures may
be roughly broken into the following distinct stages:
1. Framing of charge or giving of notice.
This is the beginning of a trial. At this stage, the judge is required to weigh the
evidence for the purpose of finding out whether or not a prima facie case against the
accused has been made out. In case the material placed before the court discloses
grave suspicion against the accused that has not been properly explained, the court
frames the charge and proceeds with the trial. If, on the contrary, upon consideration
of the record of the case and documents submitted and after hearing the accused
person and the prosecution in this behalf, the judge considers that there is not
sufficient ground for proceeding, the judge discharges the accused and records
reasons for doing so. [7]
The words “not sufficient ground for proceeding against the accused” mean that the
judge is required to apply a judicial mind in order to determine whether a case for
trial has been made out by the prosecution. It may be better understood by the
proposition that whereas a strong suspicion may not take the place of proof at the trial
stage, yet it may be sufficient for the satisfaction of the court in order to frame a
charge against the accused person.
The charge is read over and explained to the accused. If pleading guilty, the judge
shall record the plea and may, with discretion convict him however if the accused
pleads not guilty and claims trial, then trial begins. Trial starts after the charge has
been framed and the stage preceding it is called inquiry. After the inquiry, the charge
is prepared and after the formulation of the charge the trial of the accused starts. A
charge is nothing but formulation of the accusation made against a person who is to
face trial for a specified offence. It sets out the offence that was allegedly committed.
2. Recording of prosecution evidence
After the charge is framed, the prosecution is asked to examine its witnesses before
the court. The statement of witnesses is on oath. This is called examination-in-chief.
The accused has a right to cross-examine all the witnesses presented by the
prosecution [8] .
Section 309 of the Crpc further provides that the proceeding shall be held as
expeditiously as possible and in particular, when the examination of witnesses has
once begun, the same shall be continued day-to-day until all the witnesses in
attendance have been examined.
3. Statement of accused
The court has powers to examine the accused at any stage of inquiry or trial for the
purpose of eliciting any explanation against incriminating circumstances appearing
before it. However, it is mandatory for the court to question the accused after
examining the evidence of the prosecution if it incriminates the accused. This
examination is without oath and before the accused enters a defence. The purpose of
this examination is to give the accused a reasonable opportunity to explain
incriminating facts and circumstances in the case.
4. Defence evidence
If after taking the evidence for the prosecution, examining the accused and hearing
the prosecution and defence, the judge considers that there is no evidence that the
accused has committed the offence, the judge is required to record the order of
acquittal [9] .However, when the accused is not acquitted for absence of evidence, a
defence must be entered and evidence adduced in its support. The accused may
produce witnesses who may be willing to depose in support of the defence. The
accused person is also a competent witness under the law. The accused may apply for
the issue of process for compelling attendance of any witness or the production of any
document or thing. The witnesses produced by him are cross-examined by the
prosecution [10] .
The accused person is entitled to present evidence in case he so desires after
recording of his statement. The witnesses produced by him are cross-examined by the
prosecution. Most accused persons do not lead defence evidence. One of the major
reasons for this is that India follows the common law system where the burden of
proof is on the prosecution, and the degree of proof required in a criminal trial is
beyond reasonable doubt.
5. Final arguments
This is the final stage of the trial. The provisions of the Crpc provide that when
examination of the witnesses for the defence, if any, is complete, the prosecutor shall
sum up the prosecution case and the accused is entitled to reply. The same is provided
for under section 234 of the code [11] .
6. Judgment
After conclusion of arguments by the prosecutor and defence, the judge pronounces
his judgment in the trial [12] . Here it is relevant to mention that the Crpc also
contains detailed provisions for compounding of offences. It lists various
compoundable offences under table 1 of the Indian Penal Code which may be
compounded by the specified aggrieved party without the permission of the court and
certain offences under table 2 that can be compounded only after securing the
permission of the court compounding of offences also brings a trial to an end [13] .
Under the Crpc an accused can also be withdrawn from prosecution at any stage of
trial with the permission of the court. If the accused is allowed to be withdrawn from
prosecution prior to framing of charge, this is a discharge, while in cases where such
withdrawal is allowed after framing of charge, it is acquittal [14] .
The above described is the process how a trial takes place for dispensation of a
criminal case although this six stepped procedure looks plain and simple it suffers
from many inherent lacunas which become the reasons for delay and hampers an
expeditious trial and not to forget the option of appeal is again there where the state or
the criminal has option to appeal to appellate court and as well as seek a permission to
file a special leave petition to the supreme court where in again all this process is
repeated except for the fact that the supreme court only deals with cases where there
is a question of law involved.
The following are some of the problems of our trial procedure which pose as hurdles
to speedy dispensation of cases;
Investigation though is the foundation of the Criminal Justice System but is
unfortunate that it is not trusted by the laws and the courts themselves the same can
be explained by a perusal of sections 161 and 162 of the Criminal Procedure Code
which provides that the statements of the witnesses examined during investigation are
not admissible and that they can only be used by the defence to contradict the maker
of the statement, the confession made by accused is also not admissible in evidence.
The statements recorded at the earliest stage normally have greater probative value
but can’t be used in evidence.
It is common knowledge that police often use third degree methods during
investigation and there are also allegations that in some cases they try to suppress
truth and put forward falsehood before court for reasons such as corruption or
extraneous influences political or otherwise. Unless the basic problem of
strengthening the foundation is solved the guilty continue to escape conviction and
sometimes even innocent persons may get implicated and punished.
Secondly the police officers face excessive work load due to lack of manpower and
the public at large is non co-operative because of the public image of the police
officers and there is lack of coordination with other sub-system of the Criminal
Justice System in crime prevention to add to the agony there is a lot of misuse of bail
and anticipatory bail provisions, more over due to Political and executive interference
police is directed for other tasks which are not a part of police functions. It may be apt
to point out that the rank of the IO investigating a case also has a bearing on the
quality of investigation. The minimum rank of a station house officer (SHO) in the
country is sub inspector (SI). However, some of the important police stations are
headed by the officers of the rank of Inspector. It has been observed that
investigations are mostly handled by lower level officers, namely, HC and ASI etc.
The senior officers of the police stations, particularly the SHOs generally do not
conduct any investigations themselves. This results in deterioration of quality of
investigations. It is therefore necessary to address ourselves to the problems and
strengthen the investigation agency. Furthermore the common citizen is not aware of
the distinction between cognizable and non-cognizable offences. There is a general
feeling that if anyone is a victim of an offence the place he has to go for relief is the
police station. It is very unreasonable and awkward if the police were to tell him that
it is a non-cognizable offence and therefore he should approach the Magistrate as he
cannot entertain such complaint.
Thirdly, the investigation of a criminal case, however good and painstaking it may be,
will be rendered fruitless, if the prosecution machinery is indifferent or inefficient.
One of the well-known causes for the failure of a large number of prosecutions is the
poor performance of the prosecution. In practice, the accused on whom the burden is
little engages a very competent lawyer, while, the prosecution, on whom the burden is
heavy to prove the case beyond reasonable doubt, is very often represented by
persons of poor competence, and the natural outcome is that the defence succeeds in
creating the reasonable doubt on the mind of the court.
Fourthly, the most notorious problem in the functioning of the courts, particularly in
the trial courts is the granting of frequent adjournments on most flimsy grounds. This
malady has considerably eroded the confidence of the people in the judiciary.
Adjournments contribute to delays in the disposal of cases. They also contribute to
hardship, inconvenience and expense to the parties and the witnesses. The witness has
no stake in the case and comes to assist the court to dispense justice. He sacrifices his
time and convenience for this. If the case is adjourned he is required to go to the court
repeatedly. He is bound to feel unhappy and frustrated. This also gives an opportunity
to the opposite party to threaten or induce him not to speak the truth therefore the
right to speedy trial is thwarted by repeated adjournments.
Fifthly, one of the major causes for delay even in the commencement of trial of a
criminal case is service of summons on the accused. The Code of Criminal Procedure
provides for various modes of service. Section 62 of the Code provides that summons
shall be served by a Police Officer, or subject to such rules being framed by the State
Government, by any officer of the Court or other public servant. Unfortunately rules
have not been framed by many State Governments to enable service otherwise than
through police officers. Since the Criminal Procedure Code itself provides for other
means of service namely through registered post in the case of witnesses, it should
also provide for service on accused through facilities of courier service, fax where
available.
Lastly our country suffers from low judge population ratio because of which the
pendency of work increases therefore the judges take a long time in delivering
judgments this again adds to enlargement of the time frame of a case to be decided
from its intuition point because of which the litigants feel that litigation is a time
consuming and lengthy procedure the two areas which need special attention for
improving the quality of justice are prescribing required qualifications for the judges
and the quality of training being imparted in the judicial academics.
Since the above problems curb the speedy dispensation of cases the researcher in
order to provide or seek a solution for remedying and trying to move away from the
old colonial shackles has undertaken to research upon this topic where the main
research ground would be whether introduction ADR techniques in certain criminal
cases would lead to speedy dispensation of cases without calling in for a major
infrastructural change for this very same purpose the researcher has chosen six
particular sections which would be dealt further where each section would be
explained along with a its classification and which method of trial is followed and by
using a certain technique of ADR in trial of that particular offence would lead to
expeditious and fair trial as when compared to the traditional litigation method ,
The researcher owing to paucity of time and since compulsory compromise is not
possible all criminal cases the researcher has undertaken to propose the following;
Adding more offences under section 320(1) table from the table under section 320(2)
i.e. offence which are to be compounded with the permission of the court should now
be allowed to be compounded without eh permission of the court where both the
parties agree to settle the matter and refer the said matters for mediation instead of
normal trial procedure.
Sending all maintenance and family discord matters under section 125 Crpc for
mediation using family group conferencing method instead of normal court trial.
Using victim offender mediation method for cases under section 323 IPC i.e. HURT.
Using victim offender mediation method for cases under section 379 IPC i.e. Theft.
Using victim offender mediation method or early neutral evaluation method for cases
of Criminal breach of trust dealt under section 405-408 IPC.
Sending cases of defamation dealt under section 499 IPC for mediation.
For the sake of brevity the researcher would divide the scope of introducing ADR
techniques into two chapters being scope of ADR in Code of Criminal procedure
where in section 320 and section 125 would be dealt with and the next following
chapter would be discussing about introducing ADR techniques in the substantive
criminal law i.e. IPC and would deal each section as a sub part of the next chapters
where in the following would be its sub –sub parts;
Content of the section and its explanation.
Which technique of ADR to be used for resolution of that dispute and matching the
dispute resolution process which would lead fair and expeditious trial.
A case law showing delay caused due to following of normal trial procedure with
reference to that particular section and how usage of a particular technique of ADR
would resolve the said problem or where already such changes are being incorporated
or have been recommended by the Courts.
Now further we would move to the next chapter where in the researcher would
discuss about introducing ADR techniques in the Code of criminal procedure, 1973.