http://www.cybervictims.org
The December 2012 brutal Delhi
rape had given birth to numerous issues. This included knee jerking awakening regarding
the safety of women and a feeling of insecurity due to too many laws but too
less execution of them. The incidence had also showcased the need of new
sensible laws which can protect women not only in theory, but also in practice.
The best result of this painful incidence is probably the Justice Verma
committee report on proposal to amend the criminal law of India. The report did
promise to fill in many gaps which were left for so long by numerous law amendment
committees. Undoubtedly one of the notable moves by this committee was giving
legal recognition to the offence of Stalking. In my blogs and many of my write-ups I had
pointed out that we in India really needed a legal recognition for stalking. I
had also pointed out in our 2010 report “Cyber victimization in India : A
baseline survey report” that many individuals, including victims do not
actually understand the nature of stalking, especially online stalking. In this
report we had analysed online stalking as follows:
“In
real life, stalking if we analyze the
US laws on stalking, the nearest explanation of cyber stalking could be found
in Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005
which amended Communications Act of 1934
(47 U.S.C. 223(h)(1)) through Section 113 to include the use of any device or
software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of
communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet for
the purpose of ‘stalking’ , annoying and
harassing others as penal offence. This US provision attempts to explain cyber
stalking as follows;
Cyber stalking= following the victim’s
internet activities + using digital
device, software to create harassing,
threatening , abusing mails/messages etc
+ transmitting the said mail to the victim’s inbox and / or victim’s friends or
relative’s inboxes + successfully creating fear, annoyance, irritation harassed
feeling in the victim.
We
feel those who never understood how stalking may have happened or whether
stalking has at all happened or not, perhaps feel confused with the whole
component parts of the stalking. In one word, when ‘following’ is added by Mens
rea to commit harm and it is successfully digitally carried out, we can say
cyber stalking has happened.”[1]
I
am extremely happy to note that the Verma committee report in January, 2013 has
built up anti stalking law quite in the same tune. The report suggests
introduction of S.354C(1) to the Indian Penal code which defines stalking in
following lines[2]
“Whoever follows a person or contacts or attempts to contact
such person to foster personal interaction repeatedly despite a clear
indication of disinterest by such person or whoever monitors the use by a
person of the internet, email or any other form of electronic communication or
watches or spies a person in a manner that results in fear of violence or
serious alarm or distress, in the mind of such person or interferes with the
mental peace of such person, commits the offence of stalking.”
Note that the proposed law specifically mentions the behavioural
pattern in the offence of stalking which we in 2010 report summed up by stating
“when ‘following’ is added by Mens rea
to commit harm and it is successfully digitally carried out, we can say cyber
stalking has happened”. The
proposed law has mixed up offline as well as online stalking giving much scope
to experiment with S.66A of the Information Technology Act,2000(amended in
2008)(punishment for sending offending messages through communication services
etc). The punishment that the proposed legal provision offers is however
expanded from 1 year to 3 years and also with fine. This can actually bring the
offence at par with S.66A of the IT Act.
It is expected that this proposed
provision would finally prove beneficial to harassers who take up stalking
specially through cyber space to victimise others. Even though the proposed law
is expected to draw criticism for its proviso and also for its effectiveness in
the long run, it is still a welcome move.
Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would
like to use informations provided in this blog for your own
assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “Now
India can boast of an anti-stalking law”, 25th
January,2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”
[1] See pg.12, Halder, D., & Jaishankar, K.
(2010). Cyber Victimization in
India: A Baseline Survey Report. Tirunelveli, India: Centre for Cyber
Victim Counselling. Accessed on 25-01-2013
[2] See pg 437 of the Report of the committee on amendments to criminal
law accessed from @ http://ibnlive.in.com/news/full-text-justice-js-verma-committee-report-on-amendments-to-criminal-law/317383-53.html
on 25.01.2013
