The Supreme Court Friday took note, on its own, of the alarming rise in the number of rape incidents against children and said it will pass directions to ensure a “concerted” and “clear” national response against such acts.
A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi said it hasdecided to take “suo motu” (on its own) cognisance of various reportsof newspapers and portals on rising incidents of child rape.
The bench, also comprising Justices Deepak Gupta andAniruddha Bose, appointed senior advocate V Giri as amicus curiae (friend ofthe court) and asked him to assist it in framing guidelines on the kind ofdirections that can be issued to states on infrastructure and video-recordingof the proceedings.
It made clear that no third party except Giri and SolicitorGeneral Tushar Mehta would be allowed to intervene in the matter saying thatotherwise nothing can happen in such a matter.
The bench directed the apex court registry to register thecase as a writ petition titled as “In-re Alarming Rise in The Number ofReported Child Rape Incidents” and posted it Monday for issuance ofdirections.
The bench said it had asked the Registry to file a report ontwo aspects such as the total number of rape cases involving child registeredacross India since January 1 and the stage of investigation and the time takento file a charge sheet as also the status of trials.
It had asked the Registry to collect details from all thestates and high courts.
Referring to the data on sexual crimes against children, itsaid that from January 1 to June 30 this year, 24,212 FIRs have been filedacross India.
Out of over 24,000 cases, 11,981 are still being probed bythe police and in 12,231 cases, police have filed the charge sheet, it said.
Trials have commenced in 6,449 cases only, it said, addingthat they are yet to commence in 4,871 cases.Till now, the trial courts have decided only 911cases, about 4 per cent of the total cases registered, it said.