Report No. 198

(Q) 13. Should the decision either admitting or refusing to admit a person to the Witness Protection Programme, be made appealable? To avoid delays, should such appeal lie directly to the High Court?

This is about the question that whether there should be right to appeal against the order of admitting or refusing to admit a person to the Witness Protection Programme? If there is need to have right to appeal, to which Court should such appeal lie? In order to avoid delay it is suggested that such an appeal may go directly to the High Court.

27 respondents (out of 38) are of the view that there should be right to appeal against the order of admitting or refusing to admit a person to the Witness Protection Programme. Except the State Govt. of West Bengal all others have agreed that such appeal may lie to the High Court. Many respondents have opined that such appeal should be disposed off in a fixed time period. Among these 27 responses, 5 are from State Governments, 8 are from Police Officers, 2 from Judges and 12 are from others.

State Governments of Orissa and of Manipur, and organization (SARI) have opined that there should be right of appeal only against order of refusal to admit into the Programme and not against the order for admitting into the Programme. 1768 respondents (2 State Governments, 2 Police Officer, a Judge of a High Court and 3 others are not in favour of providing any appeal against the order of admitting or refusing to admit into the Programme.

(Q) 14. Do you have any other suggestions in respect of Witness Protection Programme?

Many respondents have given their suggestions. But there is no much substance in them. Therefore, these are not discussed here.