By the term "legislative process", I refer to the laws passed and rights guaranteed, and not the procedure of filing complaints in courts.
The legislative process for child safety in India stems from two roots, firstly, the binding international conventions and agreements that India has ratified, and secondly, the Indian laws on the same. From a broad perspective, the international conventions serve as a foundational stone for relatively fundamental rights and Indian laws add on to these, bringing in more specific protections. While some child safety measures arise out of laws not specific to children, such as our fundamental rights, others come from child-specific legislation, like the Juvenile Justice Act 2015. All of these are explored below.
When looking at international law and treaties, we look mostly at binding conventions by the United Nations. A good starting point would be the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, of which Article 3 guarantees to all the right to life, liberty and security of person". This provision is the first of many that establish personal security as a universal right. Similarly, Articles 4 and 5 protect everyone from slavery, servitude and inhuman treatment. Furthermore, Article 8, similar to a fundamental right in the Indian Constitution, guarantees the right to constitutional remedies for violations of these rights. Whilst the very basics of child safety are carved out here, a more focused approach is the UN Convention on the Rights of Child (UNCRC), whose treaties are all ratified by India. The Convention has 54 articles that cover all aspects of a child’s life and set out the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights that all children everywhere are entitled to. It also emphasises how adults and governments ought to cooperate to ensure that every child enjoys all of his/her rights. The CRC establishes the right to Life, survival and development; Protection from violence, abuse or neglect; An education that enables children to fulfill their potential; Be raised by, or have a relationship with, their parents; and to express their opinions and be listened to. Furthermore, under this convention, conscription of minors is prohibited, along with child prostitution, child pornography and the sale of children into slavery. In essence, all of these provisions are legally pledged to all Indian children, and a violation of these can be reported to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child.
Specific to India, child protection is achieved by means of provisions in the Indian constitution, federal laws passed by parliament and court precedents. The Constitution of India, the mother-figure to all Indian law, provides that the state, as a directive principle of state policy, must seek to ensure “that children are given opportunities and facilities to develop in a healthy manner and in conditions of freedom and dignity and that childhood and youth are protected against exploitation and against moral and material abandonment” Article 15, which protects against discrimination on various grounds, contains an important provision that “nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any special provision for women and children”. Moving along those lines, in 2016, the Ministry of Women and Child Development published a National Plan of Action for Children whose objective is to “protect all children from all forms of violence and abuse, harm, neglect, stigma, discrimination, deprivation, exploitation including economic exploitation and sexual exploitation, abandonment, separation, abduction, sale or trafficking.”
Under Indian federal legislation, the primary child protection provisions are in the following. The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, (2015) is a key provision, of which Chapter IX defines certain offenses against children. The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012 contains provisions protecting children from sexual assault and harassment, as well as pornography, and provides for the establishment of special courts to trial these offenses. The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (established March 2007) under the Commissions for Protection of Child Rights Act, 2005 is tasked with periodically reviewing laws, policies, and programs to ensure that they are compatible with child rights as enshrined in the Constitution of India and the UNCRC, and that they keep up with any other social and technological changes.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, it has only been harder to prevent and penalise such crimes against children. India was already notorious for many violations of child safety going unreported, from harsh working conditions for child labourers to unreported sexual abuse cases, and in times of the pandemic, India’s children are the most vulnerable. Since March 2020, child labour has gone up by almost 3 times. The pandemic is also likely to increase the risk of online abuse children might face. Though there isn’t direct legislation that aims at this class of violations, various sections of the IPC, sections 66E & 67B of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and Sections 11-16 of the POCSO Act 2012 are means of penalisation for online abuse. To guide parents and caregivers on steps to ensure children’s safety, UNICEF India published a handbook on the same, issuing guidelines on aiding children physically and mentally. In conclusion, India has a robust legislature to penalise those found guilty of these violations, but we need to develop our crime reporting establishments and spread awareness about the same.
By Tejas Deshpande,
For Mudita Foundation (NGO)
References
Juvenile Justice Act - http://cara.nic.in/PDF/JJ%20act%202015.pdf
Child Protection Handbook - NCPCR, Gov. of India - https://ncpcr.gov.in/showfile.php?lang=1&level=2&&sublinkid=1679&lid=1682
Ahmad, Tariq. "Child Protection Law And Policy In India". Loc.Gov, 2021, https://www.loc.gov/law/help/child-protection-law/india.php#_ftn11. Accessed 25 May 2021.