The trial of the 23-year-old woman who was fatally gang-raped in India last month is set to begin today. The five men accused in the rape will be brought forth in a “fast track” trial created after global outrage erupted in the wake of the assault.
But the process is atypical of the Indian justice system. A United Nations study reports that India has just 14 judges per million people, making it the fourth lowest in the world.
Law enforcement is not only ineffective, it is harmful to the people it is supposed to protect. India has only 1,585,117 officers to protect 1.2 billion people, making it the second lowest ratio among 50 countries ranked by the United Nations.
Arvind Verma is a professor of criminal justice at Indiana University and an expert on the Indian police and a consultant to the government.
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