Punjab Cabinet on Wednesday decided to extend to the State two major ordinances recently promulgated by the Central Government — the ordinances relating to cases involving rapes and fugitive economic offenders.
The Cabinet meeting approved re-publication of the Criminal law (Amendment) Ordinance, 2018 (Ordinance No.2 of 2018), promulgated by the Central Government to make the law on rape more stringent, in Punjab Gazette for information of the general public and its effective implementation in the State.
The Chief Minister was all in favour of stricter punishment for rape convicts, with the other members of the Cabinet also unanimously supporting him.
Further, in consonance with the Finance Ministry's proposal of promulgating the Fugitive Economic Offenders Ordinance, 2018, the Cabinet gave its nod to republish the aforesaid ordinance in the official Gazette of the State in the larger public interest.
Besides death penalty for rape of a girl child under 12 years of age, the Criminal law (Amendment) Ordinance amends the Indian Penal Code (IPC) to provide for enhancement of minimum punishment for rape from the existing seven to 10 years.
The minimum punishment for the offence of rape of a girl child under 16 years of age has been fixed at life imprisonment, as against the earlier provision of 20 years of rigorous imprisonment, extendable to imprisonment for rest of convict's life.
The Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) has also been amended under the ordinance to ensure mandatory completion of investigation in rape cases within two months. Trial of rape cases is also required to be completed in two months, with a total limit of six months fixed for disposal of appeals in all rape cases.
As far as the fugitive economic offenders are concerned, the Ordinance empowers the authorities to attach and confiscate properties and assets of economic offenders, such as loan defaulters, who flee the country.
The Ordinance was promulgated by the Centre in the wake of the recent financial frauds, especially Rs 13,000 crore Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam where Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi fled the country.
The absence of offenders during investigations poses problems for the probing agencies, apart from undermining the law of the country.