CRIMINAL PROCEDURE IDENTIFICATION ACT 2022
The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act 2022 provides a legal sanction to law enforcement agencies for taking measurements of convicts and other persons for identification and investigation of criminal matters.
It comes into effect from August 4, 2022
It repeals the existing identification of prisoners act, of 1920
USE OF IDENTIFICATION DETAILS IN CRIMINAL TRIALS
Measurement and photographs for identification have three main purposes-
1) To establish the identity of the culprit against the person being arrested
2) To identify suspected repetition of similar offences by the same person
3) To establish a previous conviction.
IDENTIFICATION OF PRISONERS ACT 1920
Even though the police have powers of arrest, a mere arrest does not give them the right to search a person
The policy requires legal sanction to search the person and collect evidence. These legal sanctions are designed to maintain a balance between the rights of an individual and the interest of society in the prosecution and prevention of offences.
Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920 became a necessity when the recording of newer forms of evidence such as fingerprints, footprints and measurements started becoming more accurate and reliable.
WHAT WAS THE NEED TO REPLACE THIS ACT
STATE OF UP VS RAM BABU MISHRA CASE-Supreme court highlighted the need for amending this law.
In 1980, the 87th Report of the Law Commission of India undertook a review of this legislation and recommended several amendments.-
1) To expand the scope of measurements to include “palm impressions”, “specimen of signature or writing “and “specimen of voice”
2) Allowing measurements to be taken for proceedings other than those under the code of criminal procedure.
MAIN HIGHLIGHTS AND DIFFERENCES IN BOTH THE LEGISLATIONS.
Like the Identification of Prisoners Act 1920, the new criminal Procedure Act 2022 provides legal sanctions to law enforcement agencies for the collection of measurements. The purpose is to create a useable database of these measurements.
While at the state level, each state is required to notify an appropriate agency to collect and preserve this database of measurements
At the national level, National Crime Record Bureau is a designated agency to manage the process, share and disseminate the records collected at the state level.
CONCERNS WITH THE PRESENT LEGISLATION
The legislation comes against the backdrop of the right to privacy being recognized as a fundamental right. A fundamental facet of the right to privacy is protected from the invasion of one’s physical privacy.
As per Puttaswamy's judgement, for a privacy intrusive measure to be constitutional, there is a need for the measure to be taken in pursuance of a legitimate aim of the state, be backed by the law and be necessary and proportionate to the aim being sought to be achieved. In this case, while the first two tests are satisfied, as “prevention and investigation of crime “is a legitimate aim of the state and “measurements ‘are being taken under valid legislation, the satisfaction of the third test of necessity and proportionally has been challenged on multiple counts.
The following are the concerns-
1)Core measurements-The inclusion of derivative data such as” analysis “and “behavioural attributes “have raised concerns that data processing may go beyond recording of core” measurements”. That is some of these measurements could be processed for predictive policing.
While this is a legitimate concern and purposes for which the” measurements” can be processed need to be better defined, merely recording core measurements without conducting the required forensic on them would severely limit the usability of these measurements.
2)Measurement taken even in petty offences-Unlike the Identification of Prisoners act 1920, which provided that” measurement “will be taken for those either convicted or arrested for offences that entail imprisonment of one year or upwards, the current law allows for” measurements ‘to be taken if a person has been convicted/arrested for any offence, including petty offence.
The necessity of taking measurements of such persons for investigation of offences is unclear, and such discretion is likely to result in abuse of the law at lower levels and overburdening of the systems used for collection and storage of these measurements. Given that these records will be stored for 75 years from the time of collection, the law has been criticized as being disproportionate.
New legislation allows that a person who has been arrested for an offence that is punishable by less than seven years of imprisonment and is not an offence against women and children, may not be obliged to allow the taking of his biological samples. Given the option to not submit for” measurements “is limited to biological samples and is available at the discretion of the police officer, this exception provides restricted relief.
3) Mass Surveillance-such collection can also result in mass surveillance, with the database under this law being combined with another database such as those of the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and systems.
4) Violates the right against self-incrimination Article 20(3)-Concerns over violation of article 20(3), however, this argument is nebulous since the Supreme court has already settled this point. In the state of Bombay vs. Kathi Kalu oghad, the supreme court had conclusively held that’ non-communicative “evidence i.e. evidence which does not convey information within the personal knowledge of the accused cannot be understood to be leading to self-incrimination.
WAY AHEAD
The opposition raised objections that it is not submitted for public consultation or referred to parliamentary standing committees
The central government has responded that privacy and data protection-related concerns will be addressed in the rules formulated under the legislation and through model prison Manuals that states can refer to.
