Rules for identifying criminals

GS paper 2

Syllabus: Parliament and state legislature-Structure, functioning and conduct of business, Role of different constitutional and non-constitutional bodies etc

Directions: A similar post on the same issue was made two days back in fact for prelims ( MHA notification of Convicts Biometrics). This is in continuation of that and will be the revision.

Source: The Hindu

Context:

• The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) notified the rules governing The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022 and it was passed in Parliament

What is the legislation about? (Repealed the Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920)

• Empowers Magistrate: The Act empowers a Magistrate to direct any person to give measurements
• Measurement collected in physical form or in a non-standard digital format: It shall be converted into standard digital format and thereafter uploaded to the database as per the SOP.
• Authorized users: Only authorized users could upload the measurements to the central database in an encrypted format.
• Measurements include:
  • Finger-impressions
  • Palm-print and footprint
  • Photographs
  • Iris and retina scan
  • Physical, biological samples and their analysis(including DNA profiling)
  • Behavioural attributes including signatures, handwriting
  • Any other examination referred to in Section 53 or Section 53A of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.

Concerns about the Act:

• Issues of privacy
• It allows the recording of samples of even political detainees.
• The rules do not mention the procedure to be adopted for convicted persons.

Repository of the data:

• The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) under MHA: Will be the agency for storing and preserving the data of arrested persons.
• State government can store data: But it shall provide compatible application programming interfaces for sharing the measurements or record of measurements with the NCRB.

Provisions for the destruction of records in case a suspect is acquitted (Yet to be specified by the NCRB):

• Nodal officer: Any request for destruction of records shall be made to the Nodal Officer who is to be nominated by the respective State Government.
• Recommendation for destruction: He will recommend the destruction after verifying that such a record of measurements is not linked with any other criminal cases.

Insta Links:

The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022

Mains Links:

Q. Discuss different types of Cyber crimes and measures required to be taken to fight the menace. (UPSC 2020)

Prelims Links:

The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022

NCRB