Rape Victim's Examination- "Direct Medical Officers To Strictly Comply With S. 164 A (2), (3) CrPC": Allahabad High Court To Govt

The Allahabad High Court last week directed the UP Government to issue a circular to all the Chief Medical Officers of the State to further direct the medical officers to strictly comply with the provisions of CrPC. and particularly Section 164 A (2) and (3) Cr.PC while submitting the medical report and their provisional/primary opinion.

The Bench of Justice Manish Kumar also directed that the prescribed format on which medical report is to be given by the medical officers shall be uniform for all the districts in the State of Uttar Pradesh.

Before proceeding further, let's have a look at Section 164 A (2) and (3) CrPC:

The Court was hearing a bail plea of a rape accused who has been booked, inter alia, under Sections 363,342 of the Indian Penal Code and under Section 3/4 of the POCSO Act

When the bail application was taken up the Court, the Court expressed its surprise on perusing the medical report of the rape victim as the doctor had not written anything relevant in the report and in the column namely Provisional/Primary Medical Opinion, only the height and weight, etc of the victim had been written.

On being inquired as to why the Doctor did not give any provisional opinion regarding the alleged offence in the FIR, she stated that the opinion could only be given after receiving the supplementary report, however, the Court did not accept the said contention.

"The provisional/Primary opinion is to be given without waiting for the investigation reports. After the investigation reports, a supplementary report is to be followed and that is why the column of Provisional/Primary opinion is prior to the supplementary report. The Provisional/Primary opinion is to be given as per the clinical examination of the victim," noted the Court.

The Court further observed that in most of the cases, provisional opinion is always given by the doctors, who have clinically examined the victims and that it was for the first time that the Court was perusing such a flimsy report.

Against the backdrop, the Senior Registrar of the Court was directed to communicate this order to the Principal Secretary (Medical Health) and Director General (Medical Health) for strict compliance of Section 164 A Cr.P.C.

Case title - Satish v. State Of U.P. And Anr.

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