Centre wants to close IPC & CrPC loopholes that allowed Nirbhaya case delay tactics

Union Minister of State for Home Affairs G Kishan Reddy on Friday said that the Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case has revealed the loopholes in the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).  He said that the central government wants to bring changes in the same so as to ensure speedy justice for the victims.

'All the loopholes in the IPC and CrPC were revealed'

"All the loopholes in the IPC and CrPC were revealed through the Nirbhaya case. Quick punishment should be given in such matters. So, the Government of India wants to bring some changes in the IPC and the CrPC," Reddy said while speaking to news agency ANI. His comments came after all the four convicts - Akshay Singh Thakur, Pawan Gupta, Vinay Sharma, and Mukesh Singh - were hanged to death at Tihar Jail around 5:30 am on Friday morning.

Union Minister of Law and Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad has also said that Nirbhaya convicts manipulated the system to delay capital punishment for seven years.

'I wish this could have been done earlier'

"All criminals who committed one of the most reprehensible crimes have been given capital punishment. I wish this could have been done earlier," said Prasad. "Today is also the day to reflect by the judiciary, government, civil society that should some people convicted of capital punishment be allowed to manipulate the system to delay it for seven years," he added.

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The case pertains to the brutal gang-rape and killing of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in the national capital. The victim had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.

READ | Law Min Ravi Shankar Prasad breaks silence on Nirbhaya case delay, after rapists' hanging

One of the adults accused had allegedly committed suicide in the prison during the trial, while the juvenile was released from a correction home after a period of three years. The case had created an uproar across the country, especially in Delhi where a large number of people came out on the streets, demanding justice for the victim, who was renamed as 'Nirbhaya' or the fearless.

The eventual hanging of the rapists was preceded by what seemed like months and years of 'delay tactics' employed by the convicts' counsel, where they filed various pleas, mercy petitions, challenges, curative petitions and made use of other legal recourses, in an ever-changing combination of forums, from courts to the President to various bodies, and even the International Court of Justice. Towards the end, the Home Ministry moved the Supreme Court seeking that the four rapists not necessarily all be executed together, as they were making their legal moves in a piecemeal fashion thereby compounding the number of recourses available to them.

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(With ANI inputs)