Formulate national policy to provide adequate relief to rape survivors: SC to Union Government

Supreme Court on 26 May 2016 directed the Union Government to formulate a national policy for providing adequate reliefs to rape survivors. It said that setting up of a separate fund like the Nirbhaya fund is not enough and amounted to just a lip service.

The direction was passed by a vacation bench of Justice PC Pant and Justice DY Chandrachud while hearing six petitions which were filed in the court between 2012 and 2013 after the Nirbhaya gangrape in Delhi on 16 December 2012. The incident raised various concerns on safety and security of women.

All the petitions were tagged by the apex court and several directions have been passed from time to time in this regard.

Courts observation and direction

• It said different states have different schemes and there is no national plan as how the rape victims are to be compensated.

• It said that the Union Government must ensure that adequate relief is being provided to the victims of sexual offences.

The bench issued notice to the Centre, all states and Union Territories and sought their responses on the effective implementation of Section 357(A) of the CrPC and status of victim compensation schemes, along with the number of victims of rape who have been compensated.

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