Fundamental Right Of Witnesses To Testify In Courts Without Pressure & Threat Under Serious Attack Today
Case: Hari vs State of Uttar Pradesh
Coram: Justices L. Nageswara Rao, Sanjiv Khanna and BR Gavai
Case No.: CrA 186 of 2018
Court Observation: Right to life guaranteed to the people of this country also includes in its fold the right to live in a society which is free from crime and fear and the right of witnesses to testify in Courts without fear or pressure
Right to testify in Courts in a free and fair manner without any pressure and threat whatsoever is under serious attack today. If one is unable to testify in Courts due to threats or other pressures, then it is a clear violation of Article 19 (1) (a) and Article 21 of the Constitution. Right to life guaranteed to the people of this country also includes in its fold the right to live in a society which is free from crime and fear and the right of witnesses to testify in Courts without fear or pressure. It needs to be emphasised that one of the main reasons for witnesses to turn hostile is that they are not accorded appropriate protection by the State. It is a harsh reality, particularly, in those cases where the accused persons/criminals are tried for heinous offences, or where the accused persons are influential persons or in a dominating position that they make attempts to terrorise or intimidate the witnesses because of which these witnesses either avoid coming to Courts or refrain from deposing truthfully. This unfortunate situation prevails because of the reason that the State has not undertaken any protective measures to ensure the safety of these witnesses, commonly known as “witness protection”.
The State has a definite role to play in protecting the witnesses, to start with, at least in sensitive cases involving those in power, who have political patronage and could wield muscle and money power, to avert trial getting tainted and derailed and truth becoming a casualty. As a protector of its citizens, it has to ensure that during a trial in the court the witness could safely depose the truth without any fear of being haunted by those against whom the witness had deposed. Every State has a constitutional obligation and duty to protect the life and liberty of its citizens. That is the fundamental requirement for observance of the rule of law. There cannot be any deviation from this requirement because of any extraneous factors like caste, creed, religion, political belief or ideology
The present case squarely falls under the situations contemplated by this Court while necessitating the formulation of scheme/guidelines/programmes for protection of witnesses. Implementation of the Witness Protection Scheme at the time when the witnesses were deposing in the present case, would have prevented the prosecution witnesses from turning hostile. If the material witnesses were relocated from the village and escorted to the courtroom, they would have deposed freely in court.
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Keywords
Fundamental Right Of Witnesses, Testify In Courts, Threat Under Serious Attack, Witness Protection
