​Know Delhi’s sexual offenders online

NEW DELHI: In an unprecedented move but in line with the Justice Verma Commission recommendations, Delhi Police has put details of sexual offenders who have been found guilty in the past three decades on its website. This, they are claiming, will help people identify the accused and lodge more complaints about offences that might have gone unreported so far.This will help them track down habitual offenders, they say.
Senior officers said the directive to upload the details of the accused, along with their photographs, was received from the union ministry of home affairs, according to a proposal made by Justice Verma Commission. Home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde had spoken of making the identity of such accused public after the Nirbhaya gangrape incident in December last year.
According to senior officers, details of 664 culprits have been uploaded so far. “We have collected the data from our crime records office and the process of uploading began on Wednesday. We will be putting up more names soon. So far, cases from as far as 1983 have been put up,’’ said an officer at the police headquarters.
You can log on to the website, delhipolice.nic.in, and click on the ‘sexual offenders’ link on the left hand side of the window. The details are displayed year-wise with one exception. While all those convicted between 1983 and 2003 have been clubbed in one group, yearly statistics are available from 2006 onwards.
The details displayed are name, parents’ names, address and case details which include the FIR number, police station where the incident took place, sections slapped on the accused and conviction details. While the first name in the list is that of a person named Meerajudin in the Seelampur area, who was sentenced to four years for a rape in 1983, the last entry is that of Raj Kumar of Prasad Nagar.
Senior officers believe this will make people more vigilant. “We can also hope to get complaints which otherwise won’t have been received. The MHA too believes this will empower the victims and encourage them to speak up,’’ said an officer.
NGOs though seem to be divided in their views. “It is good that the Delhi Police has come out with such a list. If for rash driving you can figure on the Delhi Traffic Police page, this too is alright because the public wants to know. The rapists need to be shamed, not the victims,’’ said Pranjoli Sarkar of Nari Shakti.
Rishikant of Shakti Vahini though said that merely putting up photographs was not a solution. “The police has to be proactive. Now that they have analyzed the rape incidents – including the areas and socio-economic conditions – they should try and reach out to people through RWAs and village seniors,’’ he said.