On the last day of the monsoon session of Parliament, the Union government ambushed the opposition, if not the entire country, with the announcement that it was tabling three new pieces of proposed legislation, to replace the trinity of laws that have been the bedrock of administering the criminal law.
These bills, prepared following an undemocratic and uber-secretive consultation process of which very little remains known even today, have since been referred to a parliamentary committee for consideration and may well fall by the wayside as the government takes on more ambitious endeavours such as ‘One Nation One Election’. Nevertheless, the move represents arguably the most important legislative development in criminal law for decades and demands careful engagement and attention.
