He said that states were not given adequate time to express their views and the new laws were passed by Parliament without the participation of opposition parties.
MK Stalin (Screengrab)
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin on Tuesday, 18 June, called upon the Centre to “withhold” the three criminal laws that would become effective from 1 July, and obtain the views of all the states and other key stakeholders on these new legislations.
The new laws — Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) and Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam (BSA), enacted by the Union government repealing the existing Indian Penal Code, 1860, Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, and the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 — were enacted “in haste without adequate deliberations and consultations,” Stalin said.
In a letter to Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the chief minister said these enactments fell within List III — the concurrent list of the Constitution of India — and hence there ought to have been extensive consultations with the state governments before they were passed.
He said that states were not given adequate time to express their views and the new laws were passed by Parliament without the participation of opposition parties.
Further, the new acts BNS 2023, BNSS 2023 and BSA 2023 were named in Sanskrit and this was a clear violation of Article 348 of the Constitution of India, he said.
“It is mandatory that all Acts passed by Parliament shall be in English,” he said in the letter.
There were some fundamental errors in the enactments, he said and claimed that section 103 of BNS has two subsections for two distinct classes of murder but with the same punishment.
Some provisions in the BNSS and BNS are ambiguous or self-contradictory and implementation of these new laws would require discussions with academic institutions and revision of syllabus for law college students and this requires sufficient time, the chief minister argued.
Sufficient resources and time are also required for capacity building and other technological requirements for the stakeholder departments such as the judiciary, police, prisons, prosecution and forensics, Stalin said.
“I request the union government to review the new enactments after taking into consideration the views of all the states and other key stakeholders and withhold the aforesaid enactments already notified,” he said in the letter.
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