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Synopsis

A PIL has been filed before the Supreme Court of India seeking directions to Immediately constitute an Expert Committee to assess the viability of the three new amended Criminal Laws, "The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023”, “The Bharatiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023” And “The Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023”.

It has been further sought that a stay on the operation and implementation of the three new Criminal laws be granted.

"The title of the present Bills being Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 and Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam are not accurate as per to Interpretation of Statutes, the title of these proposed bills does not speak about the statute and its motive but the present names of Acts are ambiguous in nature...", the plea drawn by Advocate Kunwar Siddhartha states.

The plea further argues about irregularity in the passing of Bills in the Parliament as many members of Parliament were suspended with very less people participating in the passing of the Bills, and such action has led to no debate on the elements of the Bills with no challenges.

Additionally, the PIL says the introduction of new criminal laws can potentially impact lawyers in various ways, posing a range of challenges. "...the new criminal bills does not bring any new changes from the previous ones. It a way to create confusion among citizen and provide more power to police and suppress the fundamental rights of people. The main motive of the bills were to decolonize the Indian laws, but in contrary the same laws are being repeated with no new explanations with additional powers granted to the police to rule people out of fear and depriving the fundamental rights...", it adds.

Notably, on May 20th a vacation bench of the Supreme Court dismissed a PIL seeking a stay on three criminal laws passed in December 2023 to replace British era Indian Penal Code, Criminal Procedure Code and Indian Evidence Act, due to various "defects and discrepancies".

In December 2023, Centre had introduced a fresh set of draft legislations to replace the existing criminal laws after incorporating recommendations of a parliamentary panel set up in the Lok Sabha.

Home Minister Amit Shah later withdrew the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 and Bharatiya Sakshya Bill, 2023 and then introduced 'The Bharatiya Nyaya (Second) Sanhita, 2023', 'The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha (Second) Sanhita, 2023' and 'The Bharatiya Sakshya (Second) Bill, 2023', which are to replace the Indian Penal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Indian Evidence Act respectively.

Case Title: Anjale Patel vs. Union of India