Justice Dattu bids adieu as NHRC Chairperson; govt yet to nominate successor

Former Chief Justice of India Justice H L Dattu on Tuesday completed his term as the Chairperson of National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) on Monday even as the government is yet to name a successor for him.

Dattu will be turning 70 on Wednesday and as per the Protection of Human Rights Act, he will have to retire as he completes his tenure. As per the law before amending it last year, an NHRC person had a five-year term or till the age of seventy years, whichever is earlier.

Justice Prafulla Chandra Pant, Jyotika Kalra and Dnyaneshwar Manohar Mulay are the other members in the NHRC.

Besides the Chairman, the NHRC can have five members -- a sitting or retired Supreme Court judge, a sitting or retired High Court Chief Justice and three members who have knowledge of, or practical experience in matters relating to human rights.

With the amendments in the Protection of Human Rights Act in 2019, the government now also has the liberty to appoint a retired judge of the Supreme Court as the NHRC chairperson. The 2019 amendments also curtailed the tenure of NHRC Chairperson and members from five years to three years.

Sources said that the government has not issued orders regarding the appointment of a full-time Chairperson or that of an acting chairperson.

Dattu was the seventh Chairperson of the NHRC when he was appointed on 29 February 2016. His predecessors were Chief Justices Ranganath Misra, M N Venkatachalliah, J S Verma, A S Anand, S Rajendra Babu and KG Balakrishnan.

In a statement, NHRC said the Commission brought down the number of cases, which were taking long to dispose of. During Justice Dattu's tenure, 3,91,937 complaints of human rights violations were registered during his tenure. A total of 4,20,913 cases, including some old cases, were disposed of and Rs 84.31 crore were paid in 268 cases as monetary relief by the public authorities.

The NHRC also retained its “A” Status of Accreditation with the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions.

During Covid-19 lockdown, in addition to taking suo-motu cognizance of media reports on the plight of people including the migrant labourers, the NHRC also intervened in the suo motu writ of the Supreme Court in the matter of migrant labourers.

"He constituted an expert group to come out with the NHRC Covid-19 Advisories. He also strengthened the mechanism of the Commission to hear the human rights violations of the Human Rights Defenders. During his tenure, the Core Group mechanism of the Commission gained further impetus along with the appointments of Special Monitors and Special Rapporteurs to act as the eyes and ears of the Commission," the statement added.