{"id":178084,"date":"2022-04-07T20:52:45","date_gmt":"2022-04-07T15:22:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=178084"},"modified":"2022-04-07T20:52:45","modified_gmt":"2022-04-07T15:22:45","slug":"how-the-uapa-is-wrecking-lives%e2%80%af","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/how-the-uapa-is-wrecking-lives%e2%80%af\/","title":{"rendered":"How the UAPA is wrecking lives\u202f\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

News<\/strong>: Recently, an accused in \u201cthe Delhi riots cases\u201d who was charged under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), 1967 was denied bail by a Sessions Court in Delhi. He was involved in a protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2019.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is the concept of bail in criminal law?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h5>\n

The bail is based on the principle of \u2018innocent until proven guilty\u2019. It ensures that an individual is not unjustly treated, and liberty is not denied when a person is under trial or he\/she has not been proven guilty.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In normal circumstances, the bail is granted if an accused is not at risk of escaping or is unlikely to tamper with evidence or intimidate witnesses.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What are the problems wrt bail provisions in UAPA?<\/span><\/b><\/h5>\n

The UAPA prohibits a judge from granting bail to an individual if he\/she is satisfied that there are <\/span>reasonable grounds <\/span><\/b>for believing that the <\/span>accusation<\/span><\/b> is <\/span>prima facie\u202f<\/span><\/b>true.\u201d\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The <\/span>bail hearings<\/span><\/b> under the UAPA are like a <\/span>mini-trial<\/span><\/b>. It is subjected to a lot of hearings on lines of a <\/span>criminal trial<\/span><\/b>. Therefore, this process of grant of bail takes a lot of time. <\/span><\/p>\n

In these bail hearings, the judge makes <\/span>decision<\/span><\/b> based on the <\/span>arguments of the prosecutor\/police version only<\/span><\/b>. Unlike trial, in which the <\/span>defence<\/span><\/b> is entitled to <\/span>cross-examine<\/span><\/b> the prosecution\u2019s witnesses, the defence is <\/span>not entitled to cross-examine<\/span><\/b>. It is done based on the presumption that everything in the police report is <\/span>true<\/span><\/b>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A trial under UAPA often takes more than 10 years<\/strong>. If the bail is denied to a person, then it is likely that he\/she will have to spend a <\/span>decade<\/span><\/b> or more<\/span><\/b> behind bars. In addition, the <\/span>conviction rates<\/span><\/b> under the UAPA are <\/span>very low<\/span><\/b>. It means that most of the under trials are <\/span>innocent<\/span><\/b>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the UAPA case, the outcome of the bail hearing also determines the outcome of the case itself. For example, the <\/span>denial of bail<\/span><\/b> is like an accused has been found <\/span>guilty<\/span><\/b>.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, in a notorious judgment in\u202f<\/span>National Investigation Agency v. Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali<\/span><\/i><\/b>\u202f(2019)<\/span><\/b>, the Supreme Court forbade the lower courts from in-depth scrutiny of the police case.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Way Forward\u00a0<\/span><\/b>
\n<\/span><\/h5>\n

In the immediate future, the UAPA provision related to <\/span>bail prohibitions<\/span><\/b> can be diluted. The police case may also be subjected to <\/span>stricter scrutiny<\/span><\/b> during bail hearings.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/strong>: The post is based on an article \u201cHow the UAPA is wrecking lives<\/strong>\u201d published in The Hindu<\/strong> on 7<\/strong><\/span>th<\/strong> Apr 22<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

News: Recently, an accused in \u201cthe Delhi riots cases\u201d who was charged under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), 1967 was denied bail by a Sessions Court in Delhi. He was involved in a protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2019.\u00a0 What is the concept of bail in criminal law?\u00a0 The bail is based… Continue reading How the UAPA is wrecking lives\u202f\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10328,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[212,10498],"class_list":["post-178084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-gs-paper-2","tag-the-hindu","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10328"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178084\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}