Bill against character assassination of rape, sexual assault victims placed in JS

A bill that bars raising questions on the character of rape and sexual assault/harassment victims during court trial has been placed in the Parliament on Wednesday (31 August).

The "Evidence (Amendment) Bill, 2022" was placed by Minister for Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Anisul Huq in the House with speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury in the chair.

The bill also seeks the admissibility of digital evidences during any court trial. 

The minister introduced the amendment earlier this year.

It was then sent to the relevant standing committee for further examination and submits its report within 30 days.

The proposed law said that in a prosecution for an offence of rape or attempt to rape, no question can be asked in the cross-examination as to general immoral character or previous sexual behaviour of the victim.

It also mentioned that such question can only be asked with the permission of the court necessary in the interest of justice.

The digital evidences will be accepted once the bill is passed into a law.

Evidence, documents and such other things were coming online after the inception of digital or online trials of cases amid the Covid-19 pandemic. There is nothing directly mentioned about online or digital evidences in the existing Evidence Act.

With the existing law, many legal complicacies might appear if any aggrieved person files a petition with the higher court, challenging the verdict of the lower court in case of acceptance of digital evidence or documents.

In the draft law, a provision was kept for making forensic examination of digital evidence.

If the court thinks necessary or any party of the case doubts about the authenticity of such evidence, these can be gone through forensic examination.

Sufficient laboratories are there in the country for forensic examination of digital evidence and BCC has also very high technology in this regard.

The government might spread the laboratories and technology to convenient places of the country for the sake of submission of digital evidence.

The submission of false or manipulated evidence would be punished as per the laws concerned.

If anyone twists (tampers) evidence, the persons will be dealt with as per the section 211 of the Penal Code or the section 57 of the Digital Security Act.

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