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In India, the Legislature and the judiciary have taken gradual steps to develop the necessary principles by which compensation could be paid to the victims of crimes. The legislature has done it by enacting the different kinds of laws, namely, the General Laws1 and Special Laws.2 The Judiciary through the cases which have been decided by it propounded a set of principles to provide the remedy of compensation where the law is not adequate to provide a remedy to the victim of crime.The legal definition of victim includes a person who has suffered direct or threatened physical, emotional or pecuniary harm as a result of the commission of crime; or in the case of victim being an institutional entity, any of the harms by an individual or authorised representative of another entity. Thus victim of crime refers to any person, group or entity who has suffered injury, or loss due to illegal activity and the harm may be physical mental or economic.