False Criminal Allegations In India: Balancing Victim Protection And Safeguards Against Misuse
Ujjawal Gautam, Faculty of Legal Sciences, Shoolini University of Biotechnology and Management Sciences, Solan, Himachal Pradesh, India
ABSTRACT
The effectiveness of any system of criminal justice rests on the capacity of such a system to not only protect the vulnerability but also keep the innocent insulated from the might of the state. In India, the purpose of the legislation that is intended to protect the powerless through Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code (now Section 85/86 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita), POCSO Act, 2012, and the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 is to address past injustices and offer a remedy to those who have been oppressed. However, a new and disturbing trend is that of the abuse of these laws for other purposes.
The objective of this paper is to highlight that the conventional interpretation of a miscarriage of justice needs to be expanded beyond the concept of a wrongful conviction to include the highly damaging process of a wrongful prosecution. As the very process of law enforcement itself turns into a form of punishment by way of ignominy of an arrest followed by prolonged detention, the constitutional right to dignity and liberty becomes an empty guarantee. Through an integration of the important judicial precedents beginning with Rudal Sah till date, through the BNSS scheme, the objective of this study is to chart a course towards an equilibrium. The basic premise of this study is that a "Right to a Fair Trial" cannot stand alone without a "Right against Malicious Prosecution".
