Expressing concern over courts delaying framing charges after the filing of chargesheets, even in simple cases, the Supreme Court on Wednesday said it intends to issue some guidelines on the matter and sought the assistance of Attorney General R Venkataramani and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.

A bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and N V Anjaria pointed out that Section 251(b) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) says that in cases exclusively triable by a court of sessions, charges must be framed within 60 days of the first hearing, but this was not being followed.

“Why take years and years to frame charges? In civil cases, non-framing of the issues and in criminal cases, non-framing of charges. We want to know what is the difficulty or we will issue directions for all courts

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