This research paper is a stringent analysis of the condition of commercial sex workers in India and what is happening to them in this pandemic-stricken time. The study details their economic condition and what is forcing them to borrow money from treacherous lenders despite knowing the risks behind it. Apart from being exploited financially, they are also becoming vulnerable for sexual, emotional, and physical exploitation, worsening their situation even further. The research findings show that 90% of commercial sex workers in red light areas will be forced into a debt trap that is non-repayable in their lifetime, making it a massive movement of commercial sex workers entering into bonded labour, another form of modern-day slavery. Apart from the financial peril, poverty is forcing them to be in a situation of major health hazard. Being deprived of customers for so long, they might be forced to work in this uncertain situation making it an optimum ground for a super-spread of the virus. A rapid assessment method has been used to collect the data from numerous commercial sex workers across the nation. The collected data are analysed using qualitative analysis and also visualized for better understanding. As a means to provide tangible alternative solutions to the problem, the study strongly recommends occupational training programs for commercial sex workers that provide a transition into alternative livelihoods, government action against predatory high-interest loans, and the redevelopment of red light areas where economic returns can be reinvested into commercial sex worker retraining programs.

Sharing porous borders with its neighbours, India has played a regular host to refugees from Nepal, Burma, Tibet, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. According to UNHCR, as of 2014, there are more than 200,000 refugees living in India. Notwithstanding the fact that India is not a signatory to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention and its additional 1967 Protocol, its open-door policy to refugees has had adverse political and socio-economic repercussions. This article3 analyses the experience of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu with the Sri Lankan refugees from the first influx in 1983 up to 2000, when the refugees began returning to their homeland. The researchers identify the pull factors for the refugee influx and push factors that led to their return and in the process put together crucial learning that can be of significance to States dealing with the problem of refugees.

The research will conceive restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence as two sides of the same coin, and one is the result of the other as a major development in criminological thinking. Notwithstanding, roots in a variety of indigenous cultures, including spirituality and holistic healing traditions and strives to re-connect offenders with their surroundings and communities. The objective of this research is to explore the experiences of victims and offenders involved in restorative justice practices, concerning increase in their general well-being, self-esteem, and satisfaction of the process and decrease in their feeling of shame, guilt, stress, regret, and anger. Restorative justice mechanisms enhance therapeutic jurisprudence through restoration, resilience, reconciliation, reintegration, rehabilitation, reformation, and resocialization among victims and offenders. Another objective is to understand from practitioners whether restorative practices facilitate conflict resolution and discuss the alternate conflict resolution model for restorative justice and therapeutic jurisprudence.

This article focuses on the right of victims to invoke Section 372 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. In India, over the past decade or so, concerns about victims of crime have increased significantly and the need for victims to participate in criminal proceedings has practically been built into the legal framework. Perhaps, the judicial process lacks in assisting the victims in a trial. This article focuses on cases where the victim appeals against an acquittal or for lesser offences or imposes inadequate compensation. Notwithstanding an appeal, this proceeding can also be dismissed for several reasons. While this paper builds the rationality behind invoking this section, it also looks into the extent to which this section could provide justice to the victims. This goes in line with the UN Declaration of basic principles such as access to justice and fair treatment, restitution, compensation and victim assistance. The absence of a definition of appeal in the statutory law and provisions for victims’ right to appeal delimits the scope of enhancement of sentence for the accused which is a right reserved only to the State. Moreover, this article helps researchers deepen their research on the perspective of victimology and the need for victim service providers to uphold victim justice.

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