All about POCSO Act, 2012

Table of Content:

• What is POCSO Act?
• Salient features of the Act and its Amendment
• Misuse of POCSO Act, 2012
• Loopholes in POCSO Act, 2012
• Conclusion
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What is POCSO Act?

• POCSO Act has been enacted to protect children from offences of sexual assault, sexual harassment and pornography and provide for establishment of Special Courts for trial of such offences and related matters and incidents.
• The POCSO act was amended in 2019, to make provisions for enhancement of punishments for various offences so as to deter the perpetrators and ensure safety, security and dignified childhood for a child.

Salient features of the Act:

• The Act is gender neutral and regards the best interests and welfare of the child as a matter of paramount importance at every stage so as to ensure the healthy physical, emotional, intellectual and social development of the child.
• The Act defines a child as any person below eighteen years of age.
• It defines different forms of sexual abuse, including penetrative and non-penetrative assault, as well as sexual harassment and pornography, and deems a sexual assault to be “aggravated” under certain circumstances, such as when the abused child is mentally ill or when the abuse is committed by a person in a position of trust or authority vis-à-vis the child, like a family member, police officer, teacher, or doctor.
• People who traffic children for sexual purposes are also punishable under the provisions relating to abetment in the Act.
• The Act prescribes stringent punishment graded as per the gravity of the offence, with a maximum term of rigorous imprisonment for life, and fine.
• It defines “child pornography” as any visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct involving a child which include photograph, video, digital or computer generated image indistinguishable from an actual child, and image created, adapted, or modified, but appear to depict a child.
• According to POCSO Act, 2012, no hospital in India can refuse to admit the victim of child sexual abuse for treatment and examination.
• All hospitals are bound to provide first aid or medical treatment to the victim of a sexual offence free of cost.
• It shall be the responsibility of the local police or the Special Juvenile Police Unit (SJPU) to keep the child and her family and the support person informed about the progress in the case including the arrest of the accused and other court proceedings.

Misuse of POCSO Act, 2012:

• There have been many instances where it has been seen that people are implicated in false cases under POCSO Act.
• A child below the age of 18 years of age may be influenced by the family to lodge a false complaint against a person with whom her family has enmity in connection with a personal dispute and keeping them in jail for a considerable period of time.
• The accused persons arrested under POCSO Act have to remain in jail till completion of trial of the case as under the stringent provisions of the Act courts sparingly grant bail.
• If the case is false, the mental health and trauma of the accused persons deteriorate.
• As per section 33 (8) of POCSO Act, 2012 in addition to the punishment special court may direct payment of compensation to the child for physical or mental trauma caused to him or her and for rehabilitation of such child.
• Some family members of the minor child under the greed of usurping the compensation amount lodge false complaint against some rich and innocent persons.
• The use of statements under section 161 CrPC is frequently manipulated by the police for implicating someone in the case or for excluding the name of an accused person from the case.
• Statements of some persons who were not at all witnesses to the case are recorded in such a way to either favour the accused persons or implicate innocent persons by excluding their names from the statement as accused or by including their name as accused.

Loopholes in POCSO Act, 2012:

• The accused persons are considered as guilty under this Act until they are proved innocent contrary to the general principle of ‘innocent until proved guilty‘.
• The burden to prove themselves as innocent lies on the accused, making the Act very harsh. Here, the principles of natural justice are violated.
• According to section 22 (2) of POCSO Act, 2012, no punishment shall be imposed on children if false complaints are made or false information provided by them.
• Under the same section of POCSO Act, it provides for punishment to the persons who file a false complaint in order to humiliate, extort, threaten or defame another person.
• Since the child is exempted from any such punishment, many people take advantage and file false complaint through the minor child and misuse the provision of exemption.

Conclusion:

The POCSO Act, 2012, was enacted with the noble intention of safeguarding the most vulnerable group of the society i.e., children from sexual offences and hence stricter provisions of punishment and fine for the offenders including death sentence in some cases were included in this Act to deter the perpetrators of such crime. However, various loopholes and discrepancies have been noticed in the Act during its operation and implementation at the ground level, which need to be plugged and rectified for more potent and fair use of the Act in dealing with perpetrators of crime and simultaneously preventing its misuse by the unscrupulous members of the society.

Ref: Source-1

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FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)