 "Parliament")
The Opposition members of a parliamentary panel scrutinising three bills to replace the country's "colonial-era" criminal laws, including the Indian Penal Code (IPC), have complained that the minutes of the committee's meetings have failed to reflect their submissions on the issue. They have also questioned the committee's choice of domain experts who have appeared before it, requesting it to draw from a wider pool.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs held its fourth meeting on Tuesday to study the three bills the Centre has proposed to replace the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and the Evidence Act. Union Home Minister Amit Shah introduced the three bills in the Lok Sabha on the last day of the monsoon session of Parliament on 11 August. The bills were subsequently referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s Brij Lal heads the 30-member committee, with Congress Members of Parliament (MPs) P Chidambaram and Digvijaya Singh, Trinamool Congress MP Derek O'Brien, DMK's Dayanidhi Maran and NR Elango, BJP's Rakesh Sinha and Kirron Kher as some of its other members.
According to sources, in a letter to the committee chairman, a member from one of the Opposition parties requested that the discussions on the bills should be bipartisan, that members should not be rushed into giving their submissions but be given multiple opportunities to express their views in an atmosphere conducive to debate. He also requested that all members be consulted on the names of domain experts to call to appear before the committee and flagged how the minutes of the committee's meetings needed to reflect the proceedings. The members pointed out that a committee member's letter, written to the committee chairman last month, should have been included in the minutes of the committee's meeting.
Some of the experts that have deposed before the meeting include Vikram Singh, a former Uttar Pradesh director general of police; former Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) special director Praveen Sinha, who was a 1988 batch Indian Police Service officer of the Gujarat cadre; and Naveen Chaudhary, a professor and dean at Gandhinagar's National Forensic Sciences University. Others who have appeared before the committee include Joint Secretary in the Department of Legal Affairs Padmini Singh and Anupama Nilekar Chandra, Additional Director General of the Bureau of Police Research and Development. Justice Arun Kumar Mishra, Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission, was also scheduled to appear before the panel on Tuesday but could not.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs was tasked with scrutinising the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita Bill, 2023; the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita Bill, 2023; and the Bharatiya Sakshya Bill, 2023.
