Kiran backs new anti-rape law ordinance

New Delhi: Former top cop and social activist Kiran Bedi has welcomed a new anti-rape law ordinance that was cleared by the Union Cabinet on Friday.

Speaking to media, Bedi said: "I think the people demand a holistic response. It is a very part law response."

"Very well, it is a beginning made. But it is still a long way to go because the Justice Verma recommendations are a holistic correction," she said.

The Union Cabinet on Friday cleared a new anti-rape law ordinance that mandates tougher jail terms for crimes against women, including the death penalty for extreme cases of sexual assault.

The ordinance, that will come into effect as as soon as President Pranab Mukherjee signs it, will need to be passed by the Parliament within six months and is likely to be done in the Budget Session that begins of Feb 21.

The ordinance incorporates some of the recommendations of the Justice Verma commission but ignores others such as cognisance of marital rape and ammendments to the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA)

Flaying the law enforcers and calling for police reforms, the Justice Verma Committee tasked by the government to suggest stringent laws against sexual violence submitted its "path-breaking" recommendations on Jan 23 to the Home Ministry, calling for enhancement of punishment to life sentence for the crime while stopping short of awarding death penalty.

The three-member committee headed by former Chief Justice of India J S Verma submitted its report to the government a month after it was formed following a national outrage over the brutal gang-rape of a 23-year-old medical student on a Delhi bus on Dec 16 and her subsequent death from the injuries.

Justice Leila Seth, former Chief Justice of Himachal Pradesh High Court, and former Solicitor General of India Gopal Subramanian, are the other two members of the committee.