Advocate Ashwini Upadhyay on Friday filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the High Court of Delhi, seeking direction to the Police to conduct scientific tests such as Narco Analysis, Polygraph and Brain mapping during the investigation of a case and record his/her statement in the First Information Report. Plea filed in Delhi High Court seeks directions to police to conduct scientific tests for investigation
Petitioner-in-person Upadhyay further sought directions to the Police to ask the complainant whether he/she was willing to undergo scientific tests like Narco Analysis, Polygraph and Brain mapping during the investigation to prove the allegations against him/her and record his/her statement in the First Information Report.
Filed under Article 226, the petition further sought directions to the Police to ask the accused whether he/she was willing to undergo Narco Analysis, Polygraph and Brain mapping to prove his/her innocence and record his/her statement in the charge sheet in order to reduce police investigation time and precious judicial time.
It also urged the High Court to direct the Law Commission of India to prepare a comprehensive report, in order to control fake cases and reduce the time spent in police investigation, as well as to save precious judicial time.
The petitioner, who is also a BJP leader, contended that this would work as a deterrent, leading to massive reduction in fake cases, while saving the time spent in police investigation, along with the judicial time.
The petitioner said it would further secure the right to life, liberty and dignity of thousands of innocent citizens, who were under tremendous physical and mental trauma, along with financial stress due to fake cases.
He said recently, a complaint was filed against one journalist under the SC-ST Act, though the complainant and the accused did not know each other.
Presently, with the growth of technology and new means to aid justice, the investigating agencies of developed countries like the US, China and Singapore were frequently using scientific tests like Narco Analysis, Polygraphy and Brain Mapping and therefore, fake cases were very less there.
However, ‘deception detection tests’ were rarely used in India that’s why police stations and courts are filled with fake cases, stated the plea.
The plea also submitted that a narco-analysis test did not amount to compulsion as it was a mere process of extracting information through disinhibition. The results were ascertained from the video recorded during the test, which could help in disseminating more information.
The whole process was video recorded and a report was given by the doctors for further consideration and to help find more evidence, it noted.
Stating that the courts have permitted the use of different scientific tests for further investigation in many instances, the petition said a narco-analysis test was conducted by a team that comprised of medical practitioners and other officers: an anaesthesiologist, a psychiatrist, a clinical/forensic psychologist, an audio-videographer and supporting nursing staff.
The test was read and analysed by a forensic psychologist, who then presented a report accompanied by a video recording stored on a CD. If the Courts found it necessary, then this test could further be verified through brain mapping and polygraph (lie detector) test, it added.