A Crisis of Justice: The Daswanth Verdict and the Urgent Need for Judicial Reform

 

A Crisis of Justice: The Daswanth Verdict and the Urgent Need for Judicial Reform

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The Supreme Court’s recent acquittal of Daswanth, who was on death row in Chennai's Puzhal Central Jail, serves as a searing indictment of our investigative and legal system. In 2018, the Chengalpet Mahila Court had sentenced him to death for the 2017 kidnapping, rape, and murder of a seven-year-old girl—a verdict upheld by the Madras High Court. Adding to the gravity of the case, Daswanth was also accused of murdering his own mother while out on bail. The Supreme Court, however, released him, citing "serious lapses in the investigation and trial."

This verdict is more than just a legal technicality; it's a profound failure of justice. A system that acquits an individual "under the shadow of suspicion" has failed to provide justice to a murdered seven-year-old child and a woman.

If Daswanth is not the culprit, then who is the real killer, and who enabled his escape? Does a reliable system even exist to find the truth in the aftermath of a failed trial? We hide behind the grand legal theory that "even if a thousand criminals escape, an innocent person should not be punished." While noble in principle, who is accountable when this theory shields incompetence and denies closure to victims? Why are the courts and the government not showing the necessary urgency to reform this broken structure?

A Proposed Shift: From Adversarial Argument to Scientific Truth-Finding

The current judicial system, where a judge acts as a passive arbiter—listening to two adversarial lawyers, examining selective evidence, and then making an independent decision—elevates the judge to a position of near-divine power. We rely too heavily on the subjective "thinking field" of a single judge. This fundamentally adversarial structure must change. Cases should not be "argued and won"; they should be scientifically investigated and resolved.

My proposal for a reformed system is as follows:

1. Specialized Investigation Teams: The initial First Information Report (FIR) and preliminary criminal identification should remain with the local police. However, the subsequent interrogation and scientific investigation must be handed over to a higher-level, multi-disciplinary committee.
2. Expert-Driven Inquiry: This team should comprise not just police but also a criminologist or forensic psychologist, a dedicated forensic expert, and an IT/cyber expert. The trial should only commence once this expert committee certifies that the evidence in the FIR is robust and scientifically sound.
3. Inquisitorial Trial Structure: We need to move away from oral combat between two lawyers. The trial should be led by an Expert Judicial Committee (including a judge and potentially other specialists) that directly questions the accused, the plaintiff, and the witnesses to establish the truth.
4. Lawyer as Helper, Not Controller: Lawyers should be permitted to participate, but their role must be limited to assisting their client and the court in presenting facts, not controlling or manipulating the narrative.
5. Mandatory Continuous Trial: The most critical reform is continuity. Instead of endless postponements that drag cases on for years, a system of continuous trial and judgment must be enforced. Cases that currently languish for decades could be decided within months.
6. Concise and Focused Judgments: Judgment reports can be significantly streamlined. Instead of thousand-page documents, final judgments should be precise, focused, and limited to a maximum of one hundred pages, ensuring clarity and quicker judicial review.

Our judicial system is a relic, a century behind the needs of a modern nation. An urgent, concerted effort to reorganize and modernize it is necessary. The question is, who will take the initiative? We must wait for the day our legislative bodies transform into venues for this critical, transformative debate.