COVER STORY
India’s bloated system of justice has a silent, devastated majority: the undertrials
Outlook Magazine - 11 August 2025
Guilty Until Proven Innocent
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The acquittal in the Mumbai blasts case shows that no amount of compensation can make up for the losses incurred. But courts must award compensation for wrongful prosecution.
Denied the fixing of accountability for what befell them, survivors and kin of the slain in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts find their old wounds reopened after the recent acquittals
Last week—almost two decades later—the Bombay High Court acquitted them all. The judges ruled that the evidence against them was unreliable, contradictory and, in many cases, fabricated. At that moment, justice stood exposed—not because it had been delivered, but because it had long been denied.
There is a lack of a mechanism to punish police personnel who commit atrocities against citizens through legal violence.
The Indian cemetery in Gaza and the Indian government’s silence on the genocide
The Dhankhar earthquake shows why the institution of political journalism stands diminished
A year after the Citizenship Amendment Act, citizenship screening still scares Bengali Hindus, as evident from the panic over the ‘anti-migrant drive’ and voter list revision
More than 300 Bengali-speaking Muslims from Assam were forced to go to Bangladesh in the past couple of weeks. The state calls them illegal immigrants. But are they?
The Valley is wary of Hindi and non-Kashmiri indigenous languages such as Dogri of Jammu, even as the Bharatiya Janata Party pushes for both, against the official dominance of Urdu
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The acquittal in the Mumbai blasts case shows that no amount of compensation can make up for the losses incurred. But courts must award compensation for wrongful prosecution.
-
Denied the fixing of accountability for what befell them, survivors and kin of the slain in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts find their old wounds reopened after the recent acquittals
-
Last week—almost two decades later—the Bombay High Court acquitted them all. The judges ruled that the evidence against them was unreliable, contradictory and, in many cases, fabricated. At that moment, justice stood exposed—not because it had been delivered, but because it had long been denied.
-
There is a lack of a mechanism to punish police personnel who commit atrocities against citizens through legal violence.
-
The Indian cemetery in Gaza and the Indian government’s silence on the genocide
-
The Dhankhar earthquake shows why the institution of political journalism stands diminished
-
A year after the Citizenship Amendment Act, citizenship screening still scares Bengali Hindus, as evident from the panic over the ‘anti-migrant drive’ and voter list revision
-
More than 300 Bengali-speaking Muslims from Assam were forced to go to Bangladesh in the past couple of weeks. The state calls them illegal immigrants. But are they?
-
The Valley is wary of Hindi and non-Kashmiri indigenous languages such as Dogri of Jammu, even as the Bharatiya Janata Party pushes for both, against the official dominance of Urdu
OTHER STORIES
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The new NCERT history textbook is undermining multiplicity and criticality, dispelling any possibility of dialogue, debate, or discussion
