Are Men ‘guilty until proven innocent’?
Article 11 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) of the United Nation (UN) states that “Every human being is innocent until proven guilty, a fundamental element of fair trials and the rule of law, and a concept everyone can understand. “Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence. No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed”.
Article 7 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights also states that “All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law”. This principle has also been firmly endorsed in The Constitution of India’s Article 14, reads as: “The State shall not deny to any person equality before the law or the equal protection of the laws within the territory of India”. Under such legal principles and attributes to the practice of laws, why is there still a strong demand of ‘gender-neutral’ laws for advancing equality and justice, eliminating institutionalized prejudices and adopting more inclusive and equitable law enforcements to negate gender stereotypes, where there a growing common perception of women being considered as ‘innocent until proven guilty’ and men being considered ‘guilty until proven innocent’.
Human actions like hate, crime, rape, domestic violence, cruelty, abuse, adultery, etc. has no gender and can be committed by anyone, be it a man or a woman. These acts of inhumanity disgrace and punishable offences cannot be made ‘gender-specific’ and stereotyped as ‘gender-centric’ acts. It would be pure injustice to either of the genders, denial of justice to the individual man or the woman and most importantly infringement the basis human rights that every individual is entitled.
In all due respect of everyone’s human rights and dignity, justice should be served as equality and the presumption of ‘innocence’ and ‘guilty’ should be avoided and not be enforced upon any specific gender, a man or a woman, but should be based and executed on the merit of the case and under proven facts and truths. The presumption of ‘innocence’ secures the right of any person, a man or woman, by not letting him/her be wrongfully sentenced or punished under any law or a legal process, until proven ‘guilty’.
Today, there is growing acceptance among people from all walks of life, including legal fraternity and system, and is also being debated, that in counties, especially like India, men are harassed, abused, blamed and also made as ‘guilty’ by exiting gender-specific laws, law enforcement bodies which are meant for protection for women like NCW, CAW, police and even the one-sided media, even before they are proven ‘guilty’ and till they prove their innocence in a long legal fight, mostly in cases like rape, matrimonial disputes, domestic violence, 498a IPC, etc. National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, statistics, and in many cases respected hon’ble courts have also found and stated that there have been many cases where women make those false accusations and file false cases against men.
The ‘guilty’ should be brought to justice, but injustice should not be done to the ‘innocent’. Men should not be held ‘guilty until proven innocent’!
S. R. Ranjan
(Singh Rakesh Ranjan)
A Journalist
(Representational images, sources)
Due process of law should be gender-neutral....
ReplyDeleteBoth a man or a woman can be innocent or guilty, justice should be done as equality.
ReplyDelete