Legal experts have said that easy remand orders passed by the subordinate courts as and when the police demand must be stopped since such practice is questioning the fairness of justice and the constitutional guarantee that an accused cannot be witness against himself undermining the fundamental rights of a detained suspect.
Our Supreme Court gave guidelines to the effect that he should be interrogated first, if so necessary, at jail gate. But in the presence his lawyer within hearing distance. Thereafter if the court is satisfied then remand to police can be ordered. But lawyer’s presence has not been dispensed with. He is entitled to his lawyer assistance as soon he is arrested.
This is our Constitutional requirement and followed in other countries where the rule of law has any meaning.
A person is arrested on mere suspicion and then he is subjected to interrogation all by himself to seek out materials against whom? In our legal system it is for the prosecution to prove the guilt of the accused. Why the court should not insist on the direction of the Supreme Court when remand is granted?
They say that in the criminal cases the fundamental rights guaranteed in the Constitution means nothing. It is required as a compulsion that an arrested person must be produced in court for the court’s custody within 24 hours of his arrest. But thereafter if under court’s order he can be placed in police custody in lonely presence then the urgency of producing the arrested person in court becomes superfluous.
It is the legal diktat that a person is innocent unless found guilty by court. Here once arrested bail is invariably refused to suffer imprisonments like convicts. Thus it is so easy for the police to deny one’s liberty and right to earn one’s livelihood. The remand is often abused is not unknown to anybody. Even deaths occur in police custody. The truth is the arrested person produced in court is to be in the care of the court.
Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK), a leading rights organization, in a petition submitted on Sunday in the High Court described this remand system as totally barbaric, inhuman, cruel and in violation of human rights.
The state lawyers oppose bail insisting that the accused has to prove he has not committed the offence alleged by the police. Granting bail means he remains in court’s custody under various conditions instead of jail custody. He is not acquitted.
Many feel that our criminal justice system should be reviewed to humanise it.
The justice system is mostly abused for political reasons because keeping a person in jail is so easy. It is also not to ignore that the police is politicised and have to obey the government’s political wish.
Where there is still constitutional guarantee of its independence, the courts save the judiciary for justice to be done. The courts are not for sending people to jail but for protecting their freedom and rights.
Our justice system has to treat one’s fundament rights into the system of justice. It is alleged that many innocent people have been ruined by keeping them in jail and delaying the trial.
In our circumstance we must allow the judiciary to be for keeping innocent persons in jail. We have preventive detention law for politicians but it has no use.
We have to realise that it is not the duty of the judges to stop crimes. That is the responsibility of the police and the government to protect people from criminals before offences are committed.
