India cuts target for fast-track sex crime courts as states fall short

New Delhi/Ajmer/Kolkata: The Indian government has slashed its goal to create thousands of new tribunals to try sex crimes speedily after states like West Bengal, where the recent brutal rape-homicide of a doctor shook the nation, fell far short of targets, according to three federal government officials and an internal document seen by Reuters.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government moved to establish fast-track special courts (FTSC) in 2019 to try exclusively sex crimes, after the Supreme Court that year criticised state governments for being slow to deliver justice to victims. The court singled out Bengal and Uttar Pradesh for taking too long to reach judgment on cases involving child victims. Most sex crimes are tried by India's heavily burdened state courts, but Modi's government planned to incentivise state governments to establish 1,023 FTSCs by March 2021 by funding 60 per cent of costs. Each FTSC is staffed by one judicial officer and seven support staff. The government had projected 2,600 FTSCs by 2026 but has now revised its target to 790 due to low interest from states and a lack of judges, according to the officials and the document, an undated summary from this year of progress on the FTSC project.

Just 752 FTSCs have been established nationwide as of August, according to publicly available government data. Some states were slow to sign up to the project, with Bengal only joining last year. The opposition-led state - whose chief minister Mamata Banerjee is under scrutiny for her handling of sex crimes - was earlier set a target of 123 fast-track tribunals by March 2021, according to the officials and the document.

But only six tribunals are operational in Bengal, where there are some 48,600 cases of rape and other sexual offences pending judgement.

Details of the federal government's original target and its decision to scale back sharply are reported by Reuters for the first time.

Top West Bengal judicial bureaucrat Siddhartha Kanjilal blamed the slow response on a lack of judges but said authorities were working with the Calcutta High Court, its top tribunal, on appointing retired officials to FTSCs.

"There have been delays," he said. "We, as well as the Calcutta High Court, are seized of the matter."

The Indian law and justice ministry and the office of Banerjee, a vocal critic of Modi, did not respond to requests for comment.

Bengal has now been set a goal of 17 special tribunals by 2026, according to the undated government document and a second Aug. 30 summary on the status of FTSCs in that eastern state seen by Reuters.

India's strained judicial system has a backlog of tens of millions of cases. State courts of first instance are short of about 5,000 judicial officers, roughly 20 per cent of the judges they have been allocated by state authorities, government data show.

In one notable instance of delay, a district court in Ajmer this August sentenced six men to life imprisonment for their role in mass rapes that occurred in the early 1990s.

One of the Ajmer victims, who cannot be named under Indian law, said she was abandoned by her husband after he learned of the assault and the sentence from a traditional court had come way too late for her: "I am of a grandmother's age now and have no expectations or hope left." By contrast, FTSCs focus on specific crimes and can try them speedily. They are also allowed to hire judges on contract, including retired judicial officers.

In 2022, the last year for which comprehensive data is available, FTSCs passed judgement on 83 per cent of cases on the docket. By contrast, Indian courts overall ruled on just 56 per cent of the sex-crime cases taken on that year.

The original FTSC targets were set by the federal law and justice ministry using a formula that took into account the number of outstanding cases in each state and a target for each tribunal to conclude 165 cases annually, one of the officials said. Like his colleagues, the official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to talk to media.

In a country where cases can drag on, FTSCs "have particular relevance in cases involving vulnerable victims and witnesses," said G.S. Bajpai, vice chancellor of the National Law University Delhi, who has advised the government on criminal law reforms.

Senior lawyer Shobha Gupta, who has represented many rape victims, said FTSCs can be useful but that appeals still go through the slow traditional court system.

"What is needed is fast tracking until the last court and final verdict and execution of the final verdict in a strict time-bound manner," she said.

There is no publicly available data on how many FTSC cases are appealed but two of the government officials said it was common for sentences from lower courts and tribunals to be appealed. Nearly 42% of the 1.7 million criminal cases pending in India's high courts are appeals.

Blame game?

Opposition-led states have generally been slower to set up FTSCs, according to government data.

Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, both ruled by Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party, have met their targets, according to the three officials and justice department data.

But the western state of Maharashtra, governed by a coalition that includes the BJP, has only established 14 of its target 138.

The three officials said the federal government had repeatedly urged laggard states like Bengal to sign up, but often received no response.

The Aug. 30 summary seen by Reuters said the justice department had written to Bengal on Dec. 12, 2023, advising it to hire contractual staff "in the event of an insufficient workforce." In 2021, then-minister of law Kiren Rijiju also wrote a letter to Banerjee, seen by Reuters, in which he said his department had sent previous reminders seeking her consent to establish FTSCs.

The three officials said they received no response to the letters.

One opposition-ruled state that has met its target of 22 FTSCs is Jharkhand.

But the state of 33 million has since told the federal government it will pull out of the FTSC program, the three officials said.

Jharkhand's top law bureaucrat Rajesh Sharan Singh said officials have been conferring about running FTSCs that are entirely funded by the state, one of the poorest in India, but declined to say why.

"If the state government funds it, we will exit the central government funding," he said.

Chief Minister Hemant Soren's office didn't respond to Reuters' questions.