S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS

Suo Moto Writ Petition (Crl.No(s). 1/2019

IN RE ALARMING RISE IN THE NUMBER OF REPORTED CHILD RAPE INCIDENTS Petitioner(s)

Respondent(s)

(Mr. V. Giri, Sr. Advocate (A.C.), Mr. Krishna Dev Jagarlamudi, Adv and Ms. Uttara Babbar, )

WITH W.P.(C) No. 819/2019 (PIL-W) (FOR INTERVENTION APPLICATION ON IA 137755/2019 IA No. 175087/2019 - EXEMPTION FROM FILING O.T.

Date : 08-01-2020 These petitions were called on for hearing today.

CORAM :

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE DEEPAK GUPTA HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ANIRUDDHA BOSE

For the appearing parties:

By Courts Motion

Mr. V. Giri,Sr.Adv.(A.C.)

Ms. Uttara Babbar,AOR

• Ms. Bhavana Duhoon,Adv.
• Mr. Manan Bansal,Adv.
• Mr. Krishna Dev Jagarlamudi,Adv.
• Mr. Surinder S. Rathi, Registrar(E-Committee) Mr. Rakesh Kumar Singh, Judicial Officer

• Mr. Manoj V. George,Adv. Ms. Shilpa Liza George,Adv. Mr. Aakarsh Kamra,AOR
• Ms. Akriti,Adv.
• Mr. Renjit V. Philip,Adv.

UOI	Mr. Tushar Mehta,SG<br>Mr. Atmaram N.S. Nadkarni,ASG<br>Mr. S.S. Rebello,Adv.<br>Ms. Suhasini Sen,Adv.<br>Ms. Neela Kedar Gokhale,Adv.<br>Mr. Rajat Nair,Adv.<br>Ms. Swati Ghildiyal,Adv.<br>Mr. R.R. Rajesh,Adv.<br>Mr. Manish,Adv.
	Mr. B.V. Balaram Das,AOR<br>Mr. Raj Bahadur Yadav,AOR
State of AP	Mr. G.S. Makker,AOR<br>Mr. G.N. Reddy,AOR<br>Mr. T. Vijaya Bhaskar Reddy,Adv.
State of Arunachal<br>Pradesh	Mr. Abhimanyu Tewari,AOR<br>Ms. Eliza Bar,Adv.
State of Assam	Ms. Diksha Rai,AOR<br>Ms. Palak Mahajan,Adv.
State of Bihar	Mr. Abhinav Mukerji,AOR<br>Ms. Bihu Sharma,Adv.<br>Mr. Samarth Khanna,Adv.
High Court of<br>Patna	Mr. P.H. Parekh,Sr.Adv.<br>Mr. Kshtrashal Raj,Adv.<br>Ms. Tanya Chaudhari,Adv.<br>Ms. Pratyusha Priyadarshini,Adv.<br>Ms. Nitika Pandey,Adv.<br>Mr. Nikhil Ramdev,Adv.
Calcutta High<br>Court	Mr. Kunal Chatterji,AOR<br>Ms. Maitrayee Banerjee,Adv.
State of<br>Chhattisgarh	Dr. Rajesh Pandey,Adv.<br>Ms. Shweta Mulchandani,Adv.<br>Ms. Tanuja Manjari Patra,Adv.<br>Ms. Aswathi M.K.,AOR<br>Ms. Monali Jha,Adv.

Mr. Sumeer Sodhi,AOR Ms. Aarzoo Aneja,Adv. High Court of Mr. Apoorv Kurup,AOR Chhatisgarh Ms. Upama Bhttacharjee,Adv. Delhi High Court Mr. Annam D.N. Rao,AOR Mr. A. Venkatesh,Adv. Mr. Rahul Mishra,Adv. Mr. Avni Sharma,Adv. Ms. Ananya Khandelwal,Adv. Ms. Sangeetha M.R.,Adv. State of Haryana Dr. Monika Gusain,AOR Ms. Manpreet Kaur Bhalla,Adv. State of HP Mr. Vikas Mahajan,Adv.(AAG) Mr. Vinod Sharma,AOR Mr. Aakash Varma,Adv. State of Jharkhand Mr. Gopal Prasad,AOR Mr. Jayesh Gaurav,Adv. Mr. Shalya Agarwal,Adv. Jharkhand High Mr. Himanshu Shekhar,AOR Court Mr. Jamnesh Kumar,Adv. Mr. Parth Shekhar,Adv. State of Goa Mr. Arun R. Pedneker,Adv. Mr. Hitesh Kr. Sharma,Adv. Ms. Mukti Chowdhary,AOR State of Guj. Ms. Deepanwita Priyanka,AOR Ms. D. Bharathi Reddy,AOR High Court of Guj. Mr. Nikhil Goel,AOR Ms. Naveen Goel,Adv. Mr. Dushyant Sarna,Adv. State of Raj. Dr. Manish Singhvi,Sr.Adv. Mr. Shailja Nanda Mishra,Adv. Mr. Arpit Parkash,Adv. Mr. D.K.Devesh,AOR State of Kar. Mr. V.N. Raghupathy,AOR

	Mr. Manendra Pal Gupta,Adv.
State of Kerala	Mr. G. Prakash,AOR<br>Mr. Jishnu M.L.,Adv.<br>Ms. Priyanka Prakash,Adv.<br>Ms. Beena Prakash,Adv.
High Court of<br>Kerala	Mr. P.N. Ravindran,Sr.Adv.<br>Mr. T.G. Narayanan Nair,AOR
High Court of MP	Mr. Arjun Garg,AOR<br>Mr. Devansh Srivastav,Adv.
State of Mah.	Mr. Sachin Patil,AOR<br>Mr. Rahul Chitnis,Adv.<br>Mr. Aditya Pande,Adv.
High Court of<br>Bombay	Mr. Aniruddha P. Mayee,AOR<br>Mr. A. Rajarajan,Adv.
State of MP	Mr. Rahul Kaushik,AOR
State of Mizoram	Ms. Astha Sharma,AOR<br>Mr. Siddhesh Kotwal,Adv.<br>Ms. Arshiya Ghose,Adv.<br>Mr. Divyansh Tiwari,Adv.<br>Ms. A. Upadhyay,Adv.
State of<br>Meghalaya	Mr. Ranjan Mukherjee,AOR<br>Mr. K.R. Kharlyngdoh,Adv.<br>Mr. Deniel Stone Lyngdoh,Adv.
High Court of<br>Meghalaya	Mr. Sanjai Kumar Pathak,AOR<br>Ms. Shashi Pathak,Adv.<br>Mr. Arvind Kumar Tripathi,Adv.
State of Nagaland	Ms. K. Enatoli Sema,AOR<br>Mr. Amit Kumar Singh,Adv.
State of Odisha	Mr. Som Raj Choudhury,AOR<br>Mr. Prashant Kumar,Adv.<br>Mr. Ravi Prakash Mehrotra,AOR<br>Mr. Ankit Agarwal,Adv.
High Court of	Mr. Sibo Sankar Mishra,AOR

Orissa	Mr. Niranjan Sahu,Adv.
State of Pb.	Ms. Jaspreet Gogia,AOR<br>Ms. Mandakini Singh,Adv.<br>Ms. Ashima Mandla,Adv.
High Court of Raj.	Mr. Purushaindra Kaurav,Sr.Adv.<br>Mr. K. Parameshwar,AOR<br>Mr. Sandeep Kumar Jha,AOR
State of Sikkim	Ms. Aruna Mathur,Adv.<br>Mr. Avneesh Arputham,Adv.<br>Ms. Anuradha Arputham,ADv.<br>Ms. Geetanjali,Adv.<br>Mr. Vivek Kohli,Adv.<br>Ms. Yeshirinchhen,Adv.<br>for M/s. Arputham Aruna & Co.,AOR
State of TN	Mr. Jayanth Muth Raj,Sr.Adv.<br>Mr. M. Yogesh Kanna,AOR<br>Mr. Karthik R.,Adv.
State of Tripura	Mr. Shuvodeep Roy,AOR<br>Mr. Kabir Shankar Bose,Adv.<br>Mr. Sataroop Das,Adv.
State of UP	Mr. Sarvesh Singh Baghel,Adv.<br>Ms. Garima Prashad,AOR<br>Mr. Srinivas Vishven,Adv.
High Court of<br>Allahabad	Mr. Sunny Choudhary,AOR
State of<br>Uttarakhand	Mr. Vinay Arora,Adv.(DAG)<br>Mr. Vikas Negi,Adv.
	Mr. Jatinder Kumar Bhatia,AOR<br>Mr. Ashutosh Kumar Sharma,Adv.
State of WB	Mr. Suhaan Mukerji,Adv.<br>Mr. Vishal Prasad,Adv.<br>Mr. Amit Verma,Adv.<br>Mr. Abhishek Manchanda,Adv.<br>Ms. Kajal Dalal,Adv.<br>Ms. Astha Sharma,Adv.<br>Mr. Amit Verma,Adv.

	Mr. Pastut Dalvi,Adv.<br>for M/s. PLR Chambers & Co.,AOR
UT of Chandigarh	Mr. Ankit Goel,AOR<br>Mr. R.K.Gupta,Adv.
Govt. of<br>Puducherry	Mr. V.G. Pragasam,AOR<br>Mr. S. Prabhu Ramasubramanian,Adv.<br>Mr. S.Manuraj,Adv.
UT of J&K	Mr. K.V.Jagdishwaran,Adv.<br>Ms. G.Indira,AOR
	Mr. M. Shoeb Alam,AOR<br>Mr. Mojahid Karim Khan,Adv.
High Court of J&K<br>Andaman & Nicobar<br>Admn.	Mr. Sahil Tagotra,Adv.<br>Ms. G. Indira,AOR
	Mr. Amit Kumar, AG.<br>Mr. Avijit Mani Tripathi,Adv.<br>Mr. K.V.KharLyngdoh,Adv.<br>Mr. T.K. Nayak,Adv.<br>Mr. P.S. Negi,Adv.
	Ms. Shruti Ram Kochar,Adv.
	Mr. S. Udaya Kumar Sagar,AOR<br>Ms. Swati Bhardwaj,Adv.
	Mr. Subhasish Mohanty,AOR<br>Mr. Nishant Ramakantrao Katneshwarkar,AOR<br>Mr. Ashok Mathur,AOR<br>Mr. Gopal Singh,AOR<br>Mr. R.P. Gupta,AOR<br>Ms. Sneha Kalita,AOR<br>Mr. Prem Sunder Jha,AOR<br>Mr. Leishangthem Roshmani Kh.,AOR<br>Mr. Milind Kumar,AOR<br>Mr. R. Nedumaran,AOR<br>Ms. Radhika Gautam,AOR<br>Mr. Mahfooz Ahsan Nazki,AOR<br>Mr. Vinay Arora,AOR<br>Mr. Naresh K. Sharma,AOR<br>Mr. P.I. Jose,AOR

Intervenor Mr. Piyush Dwivedi,AOR Mr. Manoj Dwivedi,Adv. Mr. Ramesh Kumar Tiwari,Adv. In-person Impleading party Mr. Sanjeev Kumar Jain,Adv. Mr. S.K. Rajora,Adv. Mr. Akhileshwar Jha,Adv. Mr. Sandhya Sharma,Adv. Mr. Anikanissar Sayyed,AOR Mr. Raghvendra Kumar,Adv. Mr. Anand Kr. Dubey,Adv. Mr. Narendra Kumar,AOR Mr. B. V. Balaram Das, AOR Mr. Abhimanyu Tewari, AOR Ms. Diksha Rai, AOR Ms. Aswathi M.K., AOR Mr. V. N. Raghupathy, AOR Ms. Astha Sharma, AOR Ms. K. Enatoli Sema, AOR Mr. Ravi Prakash Mehrotra, AOR Mr. Milind Kumar, AOR Mr. Narendra Kumar, AOR Mr. M. Yogesh Kanna, AOR Ms. Garima Prashad, AOR Mr. Jatinder Kumar Bhatia, AOR M/S. Plr Chambers And Co., AOR Ms. G. Indira, AOR Mr. Raj Bahadur Yadav, AOR Mr. Ashok Mathur, AOR Ms. Jaspreet Gogia, AOR Mr. Gopal Singh, AOR Mr. Apoorv Kurup, AOR Mr. Nishant Ramakantrao Katneshwarkar, AOR Mr. V. G. Pragasam, AOR Mr. T. G. Narayanan Nair, AOR Mr. Vinod Sharma, AOR Mr. Sunny Choudhary, AOR Mr. R. P. Gupta, AOR Ms. Sneha Kalita, AOR Mr. Sibo Sankar Mishra, AOR Mr. Som Raj Choudhury, AOR Intervenor-in-person, AOR Dr. Monika Gusain, AOR Mr. Ankit Goel, AOR Mr. Arjun Garg, AOR Mr. Rahul Kaushik, AOR

• Mr. Prem Sunder Jha, AOR Mr. Himanshu Shekhar, AOR Mr. Piyush Dwivedi, AOR Mr. K.parameshwar, AOR M/S. Parekh & Co., AOR Mr. G. N. Reddy, AOR Mr. Abhinav Mukerji, AOR Mr. P. I. Jose, AOR Mr. Sanjai Kumar Pathak, AOR Mr. Aniruddha P. Mayee, AOR Mr. Sandeep Kumar Jha, AOR
• Mr. Subhasish Mohanty, AOR Ms. Deepanwita Priyanka, AOR M/S. Arputham Aruna And Co, AOR Mr. Nikhil Goel, AOR Mr. R. Nedumaran, AOR Ms. Radhika Gautam, AOR Ms. Uttara Babbar, AOR Mr. Mahfooz Ahsan Nazki, AOR Mr. S.. Udaya Kumar Sagar, AOR Ms. Mukti Chowdhary, AOR Mr. Gopal Prasad, AOR Mr. Shuvodeep Roy, AOR Vinay Arora, AOR Mr. Naresh K. Sharma, AOR Mr. Annam D. N. Rao, AOR Mr. Sumeer Sodhi, AOR Mr. M. Shoeb Alam, AOR Mr. G. Prakash, AOR

UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following O R D E R

Today the matters were listed for taking up the issue with regard to the State of Assam and Union Territory-Jammu and Kashmir. State of Assam has filed an affidavit indicating that ten POCSO Courts have already been set up and three will be set up in near future. Five existing Additional Sessions Judge Courts have been earmarked as POCSO Courts and ten new Courts to

deal with POCSO cases will be set up. The action appears to be in terms of our earlier orders. We would like to direct that State of Assam and Registrar General of J&K High Court to file affidavits clearly stating that POCSO Courts shall deal exclusively with POCSO matters and not deal with any other matters These affidavits to be filed by 28th February, 2020.

List on 6.3.2020.

Jammu and Kashmir

On the last date i.e. 16.12.2019 in respect of the Union territory J&K we had passed the following order:

"Keeping in view the peculiar situation of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, we direct that fresh affidavit be filed by the State as well as the Registrar General of the High Court on or before 6.1.2020. List on 8.1.2020."

No affidavit has been filed either by the Union Territory of J&K or by the High Court. Learned counsel for the Union Territory of J&K refers to the affidavit filed on 15th December, 2019 which clearly shows that there are no exclusive courts set up in the J&K to deal with POCSO matters. We had passed order dated 16.12.2019 which clearly laid down the criteria that in any District which has more than 100 POCSO cases, there will be atleast one exclusive POCSO Court and in any District where there are more than 300 POCSO cases, there should be atleast two POCSO Courts. We direct the Chief Secretary of the Union Terriytory of J&K to sit with the Registrar General of the High Court of J&K on or before 24th January, 2020. They shall prepare a chart of POCSO cases in each District.If there are more than 100 cases in any District then in pursuance of our directions dated 16.12.2019 one exclusive POCSO Court shall be set up and made functional before 1st March 2020. We make it clear that in case there is no District having more than 100 cases then there is no need to set up exclusive POCSO Court.

List on 6.3.2020.

Letters sent by daughter of Mr. Kuldeep Singh Sengar

The complaint letter had been filed by the daughter of Mr. Kuldeep Singh Sengar. Keeping in view the fact that trial is completed and Mr. Kuldeep Singh has been convicted there is no need to pursue this matter.

EXCLUSIVE PUBLIC PROSECUTERS FOR POCSO (The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) COURTS

In our earlier orders we had emphasised the need to have exclusive Special Public Prosecutors for POCSO cases.

Section 32 of the POCSO Act clearly lays down that there shall be Special Public Prosecutors for the POCSO cases. Sub-Section 1 of Section 32 reads as follows:

"Every State must by Notification appoint a Special Public Prosecutor for every Special Court for conducting cases only under the provisions of the Act."

(Emphasis supplied)

The language of the Act leaves no manner of doubt that the Special Public Prosecutor under the Act should not deal with other cases.

There is a salutary reason for appointing Public Prosecutors exclusively for POCSO cases. Public Prosecutors must be trained to deal with child victims and child witnesses. They need to understand the psychology of children. They need to empathize with children. They need to know how to bring out the truth from children who are victims of sexual abuse and have to undergo the trauma again while recounting the traumatic experience.

The job assigned to the Public Prosecutor for POCSO cases is a very onerous one which must be carried out with great care and sensitivity. Therefore not only is there a need to have exclusive Public Prosecutors but there is also a need to develop a training programme where these Special Public Prosecutors should be trained to deal with issues which will arise in their Courts. These issues may not be confined to legal issues which otherwise Public Prosecutors may be trained to deal with. The issues may be

psychological, health and other related issues.

Keeping in view these factors, we direct all the States who are present before us to take steps to appoint exclusive Public Prosecutors in all the Courts which have been set up exclusively for POCSO cases. We request the Chief Justices of all High Court to ensure that in the Judicial Academy of the State special programmes are developed so that these Special Public Prosecutors attached to POCSO Courts are imparted training not only in law but also in child psychology, child behaviour, health issues etc. We also request the Director of the National Judicial Academy to ensure that a training programme is developed in the National Judicial Academy to train master trainers who can then work in the Judicial Academies in each State. We realize that the National Judicial Academy cannot train all the Special Public Prosecutors in the country but they can prepare a team of master trainers who can travel from State to State to impart training to the persons appointed as Special Public Prosecutors.

A copy of this order may be sent to the Registrar General of each High Court to be placed before the Chief Justice of the High Court. A copy be also sent to the Director of National Judicial Academy. We request the Director of National Judicial Academy and the Registrar Generals of the High Courts to file responses to our suggestions on or before 28th February, 2020.

List on 6.3.2020.

Forensic Science Laboratories

The issue of FSL shall also be taken on 6th March, 2020 but we direct all the States to file affidavits till 28th February, 2020 giving the latest status with regard to development of infrastructure of Forensic Science Laboratories to deal with the matters relating to POCSO cases.

Human Rights Courts

Matters relating to establishment of Human Rights Courts, to be listed on Monday i.e. 13.1.2020.

State of Madhya Pradesh

Mr. Rahul Kaushik, learned counsel states that he had filed two applications on behalf of the State of Madhya Pradesh. List those applications on Monday i.e. 13.1.2020.

(SUMAN WADHWA) (PRADEEP KUMAR) AR CUM PS BRANCH OFFICER