India recently became the ninth country to launch National Database on Sexual Offenders (NDSO).
What is the objective?
The database will be maintained by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) under the Ministry of Home Affairs and made available only to law enforcement agencies.
It will include names, photographs, residential address, fingerprints, DNA samples, and PAN and Aadhaar numbers, of convicted sexual offenders.
The database will contain more than 4.5 lakh cases, including profiles of first-time and repeat offenders, based on details compiled from prisons across the country.
The offenders will be classified on the basis of criminal history and the data will be stored for –
15 years in the case of those classified as posing “low danger”
25 years for those presenting “moderate danger”
Throughout lifetime for “habitual offenders, violent criminals, convicts in gangrape and custodial rapes.
It will only have details of persons who are aged 18 or more.
Whenever the details of a convict are entered into a prison database anywhere in the country, the name will be uploaded to the registry.
Appeals against a conviction will have to be updated by state prisons and an accused can be tracked until an acquittal on appeal.
State police forces have been asked to regularly update the database from 2005, which will help keep track of released convicts who have moved from one place to another.
The registry will also store information on arrested and charge sheeted offenders but access to this will be limited to officers with the requisite clearance.
Juvenile offenders are likely to be included in the database at a later stage.
What are the concerns?
Access - The database maintained by the FBI in the US can also be accessed by the public.
But the Indian registry will be available only to law enforcement agencies and not to the general public.
Classification - There is a possibility for deeming consensual sexual activity involving a girl under 18 as “low danger” offence and be recorded in the database, if the parents of the girl files criminal charges.
Thus a person getting added to the sex registry depends on laws that can be misused to arbitrarily classify suspects.
Under – reporting - The registry does not serve as a deterrent or help people who have survived sexual violence.
In India, most sex crimes are committed by a person known to the victim.
NCRB data of 2015 states that out of 34,651 reported rape cases, 33,098 were committed by people known to the victim.
This might lead to people under reporting cases of rapes or sexual offences, when they were subjected to threatening by the offenders.
Violence - Also a data breach or even rumours of possible inclusion in the registry can also trigger vigilante violence against the accused.
It will also result in discrimination and goes against the principle of trying to reform the criminal.
