India has one among the largest populations of children in the world of concerning 472 million below the age of eighteen, with 225 million girls. For the protection of children, child regulatory offence laws in India are enacted as a part of the nation’s child protection policies.

In order to effectively address the grievous crimes of sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of youngsters through less ambiguous and more rigorous legal provisions, the Ministry of Women and Child Development championed the introduction of the Protection Of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, on 22nd May 2012.

POCSO Act 2012 was established to shield the children against offences like sexual abuse, harassment and pornography. It was fashioned to provide a child-friendly system for trial, underneath which the perpetrators could be tarred-and-feathered. This Act defines a child as any individual below eighteen years of age. It additionally makes provisions for avoiding the re-victimization of the child at the hands of the judicial system

The Ministry Women and Child Development cite the reports of rapes of young girls in the aftermath of Kedarnath floods. This data shows that children represent 50-60% of victims of calamities. Thence there was a necessity to feature rapes in course of natural calamities as the 21st category beneath aggravated penetrative sexual assault

The cabinet has approved capital punishment for those guilty of raping girls below the age of 12 under IPC. However, IPC isn’t gender neutral. Since POSCO is a gender-neutral law the amendments widen the range of cases of regulatory offence against boys and girls under 18 that are currently punishable by death.

The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Amendment) Bill, 2019 was introduced in Lok Sabha by the Minister of State for Women and Child Development, Mr Virendra Kumar on 8th Jan 2019 for enhancing penalization in cases of regulatory offence against young boys.

The Act defines different forms of sexual assault which includes penetrative and non-penetrative assault, harassment and pornography. Under certain specific circumstances POCSO states a sexual abuse is to be thought of aggravated if the abused child is unstable or when the abuse is committed by a member of the armed forces, security forces, a public servant, an individual in an exceeding position of trust or authority of the child, sort of a family member, law officer, teacher, doctor or workers of a hospital — whether or not government or non-public.

The Act additionally makes it necessary to report such cases. It makes it the duty of an individual alert to the offence to report the sexual assault. Just in case he fails to do so, the person is punished with six months’ imprisonment or fine. The Act further states that the proof of the child ought to be recorded within a period of thirty days.

The Act provides for penalization against false complaints or untrue information. It prescribes rigorous imprisonment for a term that shall not be but 10 years however which can be imprisonment for life and additionally fine as a penalization for an aggravated penetrative sex offence. It also prescribes punishment to the folks who traffic kids for sexual purposes.

Amendments Proposed:

The amendments to this Act, offer for stringent punishment, as well as the capital punishment for committing aggravated penetrative sexual abuse crime on a child, both boys and girls, below the age of 18.

The amendments extend the punishment for aggravated penetrative sex offence from a minimum of 10 years to a minimum of 20 years, up to most of the life imprisonment and even capital punishment.

The amendments are planned to safeguard children from sexual offences in times of natural calamities and disasters.

The change also proposes to change the definition of a sex offence to incorporate administering hormones to children expedite their sexual maturity for the aim of commercial sexual exploitation.

These amendments can, therefore, enhance the deterrence against sex crime on children, proving that systemic changes in law enforcement and prosecution hold the key to tackling child sexual assault.