Twenty-two years since the enactment of the Human Rights Protection Act 1993 that gave birth to National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Chief Justice of India TH Thakur on Thursday said that the law needs to be “revisited” on whether the apex human rights body should remain a recommendatory body or certain of its recommendations be binding on Centre.
Proposing the legal reform to the Centre while speaking on the occasion of International Human Rights Day organized by NHRC, Justice Thakur said, “It is time, at least, to revisit whether the entire things (recommendations) have to be recommendatory. The power vested in the NHRC has to be revisited whether it is only a recommendatory body. We must ask the Centre that there is a need to revisit the Act.”
NHRC’s Acting Chairperson and former Supreme Court judge Justice Cyriac Joseph earlier pointed out that over 600 recommendations of the Commission are lying pending with Centre and state governments making it a “toothless” body. Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju disagreed with this comment and said that NHRC was performing an effective role and any constraints can be looked into.
CJI Thakur replying to the two speakers said that even if all recommendations of NHRC cannot be accepted, certain parts of them could be made binding on the Government. The least Parliament can do is to pass reasoned order as to why the recommendations are not accepted.” He noted a large percentage of rejections of the recommendations made by NHRC headed by a former CJI and comprising retired HC judges as members.