Upgrade infrastructure of Government Medical Colleges for forensic investigation of crimes: SC to Centre

New Delhi: In a move to carry out an impartial investigation of crimes, the apex court of the country has suggested that the existing infrastructure in the Government Medical Colleges should be upgraded and utilized to deal with aspects of criminal investigation backed by scientific/forensic front and trained manpower.

The observation was made in Dilawar vs. State of Haryana case by a bench of Justice Uday Umesh Lalit and Justice Vineet Saran. The bench while noting that there exists just seven Central Forensic Science Laboratories in the country, namely, CFSLs under DFSS at Bhopal, Chandigarh, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Pune. CFSL (CBI) at New Delhi, the bench stated

In Hussainara Khatoon & Others (V) v. Home Secretary, State of Bihar, Patna, (1980) 1 SCC 108, the need to have the scientific and forensic laboratories and trained manpower was stressed by this Court so that the progress of investigation is not hampered. Though the observations of this Court in Hussainara Khatoon (supra) were made almost 40 years back, the situation as depicted in the above statistics shows that even today, in the entire country there are only seven Central Forensic Science Laboratories. Ideally, there should be at least one Central Forensic Science Laboratory in every State. Lack of facilities and inadequate manpower to deal with scientific and forensic aspects of investigation definitely delays the entire process.