THE GOVT MUST NOW INTRODUCE FAST-TRACK COURTS TO PROVIDE JUSTICE TO VICTIMS OF SEXUAL ABUSE WITHOUT DELAY
As expected, the House of Representatives has unanimously passed the Bill to Amend Some Acts Against Sexual Violence, which now extends the statute of limitations in rape cases. But it is for sure that activists will not be content with the extra year given to victims to report rape. The amendment follows weeks of protests by activists who were demanding removal of the statutory limit on rape cases.
The newly passed bill proposes to extend the deadline for reporting rape cases from one year to two years in most cases and three years in some cases. In May, four Nepali Congress lawmakers had tabled a resolution motion in the House of Representatives demanding amendment to the Criminal Code Act- 2017 so that legal action could be taken against the perpetrators regardless of when the heinous crime was committed. Under Nepal's 2017 penal code, complaints of rape must be filed within one year from the date when the crime was committed except in cases where the victim is related by blood to the perpetrator, which meant that a large number of cases were dismissed because of technical errors. The laws were even more restrictive prior to the enforcement of the penal code of 2017, when just 35 days were given to the rape victims to file a complaint.
The new bill that proposed, among others, extending the statutory limitation on rape might not have come up for discussion in the House if it hadn't been for a model who took the courage to take to social media in mid-May to make public allegations of repeated rape by an organiser of a beauty pageant that she had participated in, eight years after the incident took place.
She was just 16 when she was repeatedly abused.
But the alleged culprit, Manoj Pandey, could not be arrested because of the restrictive laws, and had to be detained under the Human Trafficking and Transportation (Control) Act, 2007. The National Assembly will now decide whether to pass the bill as it is or scrap the statutory limitations, which it favours in the case of minors. Stakeholders, however, will continue to seek either no time limitation or long-term limitation of, say, upto 20 years, for reporting a rape as in the Western democracies, where celebrities and the clergy have been convicted for sexual abuse decades after committing the crime.
While the passage of the new bill gives more time to the rape victim to access justice, it cannot, however, stop the rising cases of the crime in the country. AWOREC (Women's Rehabilitation Centre) report in 2021 says that a total of 17,790 women and girls were raped in the last 10 years, and rape cases are said to be increasing every year by 20 per cent. This is alarming, and it calls for sex education from an early age, where children are taught to respect girls and women and not see them as sex objects. Being able to talk about sex freely in the classroom among boys and girls without any feeling of uneasiness will help bring about the behavioural change in them. Now that the bill will soon be law, the government must introduce fast-track courts to provide justice to victims of sexual abuse without delay. Severe punishment for the perpetrators of the crime is just as necessary.
Foreign reserves
In its macroeconomic update unveiled on Monday by the Nepal Rastra Bank, Nepal slightly improved its foreign exchange reserves by $170 million from mid-May to mid-June due to increased inflow of remittances and import restriction on non-essential goods. Foreign exchange reserves could have also improved slightly because of the tourism activity taking place before June, the month when most foreigners visit Nepal to go on expeditions to the high mountains.
As per the central bank, the gross foreign exchange reserves stood at $9.45 billion in mid-June, compared to $9.28 billion in mid-May. However, the foreign exchange reserves have plunged by 19.6 per cent from $11.75 billion over the last 11 months. The current foreign exchange reserves will be enough to purchase goods and services only for six months, which is the lowest compared to the previous years when foreign reserves used to cover imports of at least nine months. The most worrying part is the growing depreciation of the Nepali currency against the U.S. dollar, which was traded for Rs 127.41 on Monday. We cannot improve our economy unless we are able to export more goods. Therefore, we need to focus on the export of certain goods to sustain our economy.
A version of this article appears in the print on July 13, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.
