HYDERABAD: Barely two years after the child-friendly court in Hyderabad received praise from senior judges and activists across the country for being victim-centric, things seem have slid back to the old days.
After the HC’s order, the fast track court to deal with POCSO cases in Hyderabad that was operating out of Bharosa centre was split into two.
The one dealing with cases of children aged 12 and lower was shifted to the Nampally Courts Complex and the other was retained at Bharosa centre. The one shifted to Nampally Courts Complex is now running out of the first additional metropolitan sessions court, which in addition to POCSO cases, deals with usual cases too, since October this year.
Hyderabad’s child-friendly court, when it was in Bharosa centre, used to be one-of-its-kind. The Supreme
Court, in 2018, had cited it as a model to be followed by other States. This court has separate entry points for victims and the accused. The room where the children are placed has toys and the cross-examination room has a ‘one-way mirror’ where the victim can see the accused but not the other way round.
Contrast this to the court now, children are back in the dinghy corridors of Nampally Criminal Courts complex where victims and accused of all cases wait for their turns in the same vicinity. Realising this, the judge made arrangements to place children and families in a back-end corridor, which can only be accessed from the judge’s chamber. The accused sit outside the court hall and can’t see the victims. For cross-examination by defence and identification of accused, the legal officer brings in the children via the judge’s chamber to reduce their exposure to the accused. The one-way mirror from Bharosa centre’s child-friendly court is now replaced by a cloth curtain.
“The children get re-victimised if they see the accused. They get scared and begin to deny or don’t divulge their trauma,” noted a senior official in the know of things.