The issue of lowering of the age of criminality under the Juvenile Justice (JJ) Act has been debated over for the past one year. It was raised after the Delhi gang-rape case, which had led to an unprecedented outpouring of anger and triggered collective introspection on the safety of women and girls.
This is being debated over with the report of the Parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women, which recommended fixing the age of male juveniles at 16 years and suggested a serious debate on measures to check the increasing trend of crimes that are being committed by juveniles and are punishable under the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The JJ Act was enacted in the year 2000 with an aim for incorporating its international obligations under international law into its domestic legislations. India is a signatory of the United Nation. Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989, the United Nation Standard Minimum Rules for Administration of Juvenile Justice 1985 ie “Beijing Rules” and the United Nation Rules for the Protection of Juveniles Deprived of their liberty 1990. The JJ Act 2000 is a law in compliance to its obligation to the aforesaid international treaties. The principle behind the legislation is that juveniles lack the physical and mental maturity to take responsibility for their crimes; and because their character is not fully developed, they still have the possibility of being rehabilitated. The amendment to JJ the Act 2000 brought both male and female below the age of 18 years within the ambit of the juvenile justice system, but prior to it was male below the age of 16yrs and females below the age of 18 years as per JJ Act 1986.
The Justice Verma Committee had recommended against the lowering of age of criminality under the JJ Act. The committee cautioned, “Any attempt of reducing the age of juvenility, or excluding certain children from the purview of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2000 on the basis of nature of the offence and age, will violate guarantees made under the Constitution and international instruments, the United Nation Convention of Rights of the Child (UNCRC).
But the Supreme Court had dismissed the petitions seeking direction to the Central Government for amendment of the Act and reducing the age of criminality. It was of the view, “The age of 18 has been fixed on account of the understanding of experts in child psychology and behavioural patterns that till such an age the children in conflict with law could still be redeemed and restored to mainstream society, instead of becoming hardened criminals in future.”
The provisions of the JJ Act have been debated for lowering the age of juvenility at parlance with the juvenile justice system in the USA and the UK. In the US, there was a shift from a restorative to a retributive juvenile justice policy.
This change was mainly due to a massive rise in the incidence of juvenile and extraordinary violence and brutality of juvenile crimes. Now, the juveniles involved in heinous crimes are heard in adult courts instead of juvenile courts. Similarly in the UK, a persons under 18 is tried by a Youth Court, which is a special type of magistrate’s court that has power to issue community sentences, behavioural programmes, reparation orders, youth detention and rehabilitation programmes which last three years.
However, for serious crimes like murder or rape, the case starts in the Youth Court but is transferred to a Crown Court. It can maximum sentence punishment i.e. applicable to an offender who is 21 years or an adult.
But the scenario in India is very much different as compared to the US and the UK as the juvenile delinquency rate has ranged between 1.6 per cent and 2.1 per cent of the total crimes (as against half of the total crime rate in the US), and of these only 5 per cent to 8 per cent are violent crimes like murder and rape (as against a substantial percentage of violent crimes in the US). There is a need for ensuring proper implementation of the juvenile justice system and achieve its objective. According to a media report, the total number of remand homes in India is 815 with a capacity of 35,000, But the total number of juvenile accused under the JJ Act is 1.7 million. This shows that the lacunae in proper infrastructure in the system do not ensure a conducive environment for reformation and rehabilitation of juveniles as envisioned by the principles enshrined in international law.
But in one aspect there can be amendment to the JJ Act for a maximum limitation period for sentencing, i.e., maximum three years as per the present Act. This period is very short and is neither justifiable on grounds of deterrence nor adequate for any kind of reform programme, i.e., the main objective of the Act. This period can be extended at parlance with laws similar in the UK as juveniles involved in heinous crimes can be sentenced for a maximum period as applicable to an adult.
Therefore, it can be finally said that enhancement of the period of custodial sentence and increasing it to its maximum limit would lead to a proper reformation programme and work as a deterrence among the juveniles in conflict with law. While rehabilitation is certainly an important legal and societal objective, this surely has to be balanced with creating a legal deterrent to protect women and girls from the increasing incidence of rapes by juveniles.
(The writer is a member of legislative Research and Policy Club, National law University Odisha, Cuttack)