Kerala HC rules out action against magistrate who inadvertently named rape survivor in order

Kochi: The Kerala High Court has upheld the order of a single-judge bench that dismissed a petition seeking legal action against a magistrate who inadvertently revealed the name of a rape survivor in his order.

A division bench of Chief Justice A.J. Desai *and Justice V.G. Arun gave a clean chit to the magistrate while considering an appeal filed by a survivor in a rape case.

The survivor had approached the Judicial First Class Magistrate, Kattakkada in the state capital district to cancel the bail granted to the accused A.V. Saiju. However, in his order refusing the plea, the magistrate also revealed the identity of the victim.

The victim then approached the High Court demanding action against the magistrate. However the single bench of Justice Devan Ramachandran, directing immediate anonymisation of records to protect rape survivor's identity, dismissed the petition seeking action against the magistrate.

The judge ruled that Section 228A of Indian Penal Code (IPC), which criminalises revealing the identity of victims of certain offences like rape, applies only to those who print or publish the identity of a victim and does not cover situations where a court, during the course of its proceedings, inadvertently reveals such information.

However the judge urged judges and judicial officers to be conscious and wanted steps to anonymise details in cases involving such victims. Following this order, the rape survivor then approached the division bench against the order of the single-judge, but the division bench, after detailed scrutiny, dismissed the appeal.