Juvenile Justice Bill: Are we growing up too quick?

'Offender will not be sent to court directly for trial'
Maneka Gandhi, Union minister, Women and Child Development

I don't understand what the fear is about. The ministry has decided to stick to a balanced approach. The decision to amend the existing Juvenile Justice Act is meant to comprehensively rework it to make it simpler and doable. The amendments seem to have received attention only for a small aspect — the proposed reduction of the age of minors from 18 years to 16 years in the case of heinous crimes such as murder and rape.
We have received overwhelming support for lowering the age of juveniles; most suggested that we send the child in conflict with the law to the court directly, bypassing the Juvenile Justice Board. It is important to understand that a child in conflict with the law will not be directly sent to the court or be tried under the law for adults. The amendments simply mean that whenever a child over 16 years of age commits a crime, then the system will comprehensively check whether the child committed the crime in an adult frame of mind or whether the crime occurred in innocence.
The Bill proposes to place such children in a place of safety, during and after the trial and until they attain the age of 21. After this, if the term of the child remains, then the child is to be shifted to a prison for adults. Hence, the law will still be rehabilitative in nature, and not retributive. The Bill also seeks to bring in mandatory measures for adoptions. These procedures are currently in a mess. Less than 1,000 children are adopted every year. This is why we have introduced the idea of foster care, for those who don't want to adopt.

'A child in conflict with law is one who needs care'
Kushal Singh, Chairperson, National Commission for Protection of Child Rights

The proposed amendments to the Juvenile Justice Act exclude protection for a child. The objective of any law that governs children must have a child-friendly approach and strive to attain the ultimate rehabilitation of a child who is in conflict with the law. Children between the ages of 15 to 22 years do not develop the capacity to form a decision or the judgement of an adult, and hence, are more prone to reckless behaviour. Unlike an adult, a child's behavioural attributes do not make up his or her nature. That makes it unfair to hold a child as responsible as an adult.
Most children are not hardened criminals, and it is the responsibility of a civilised society to work on ways to integrate the child back into society. Every child that comes in conflict with the law is also one in need of care. The focus must be to prevent a child from faltering at an age when he or she rightfully belongs to a school.
The proposed amendments have come in an atmosphere where there is a cry for justice for women. However, a juvenile offender who will spend his or her adolescence in jail and is likely to be set free when he or she is 28 or 30 years old, will be unemployable because of having no vocational skills and being with a criminal background.
The likely way out will be to go back to his or her criminal past. It is imperative to wade through the emotional upsurge, and think rationally to formulate a law that focuses on rehabilitation, not retribution.

'Was miserable at remand home'
A former juvenile offender opens up

One night, when I was 14, I was woken up by my mother's piercing screams. I ran to her room, and saw her swaying madly in a burst of flames. She was tired of my father's routine abuse and infidelity, and took the extreme step. She had 80% burns and endured unbearable pain before passing away two days later. My father was sent to jail.
My brother and I were sent to live with my uncle's family. To lessen his burden, I dropped out of school to help him at his shop. But I could never concentrate on work and began spending time with the boys from the nearby slums. Soon, my friend Abu and I became friends with Jobin, an older boy, who carried a gun, and his gang. I took to doing 'odd jobs' with Jobin and his gang. One day, Jobin decided that we should break into the house of an old couple.
On the decided night, we made our way into the couple's living room. To our surprise, the old woman was watching TV. One of the boys gagged her, but she had made enough commotion by then to wake up the old man. He tried to attack us, but Jobin fired at him. The old man fell down. We bundled the valuables and left. The man died on the way to the hospital.
We were all caught within a week and held in a lock-up for two days. We decided that it would be easier for us if we accepted our guilt. Since Abu and I were 17, we were sent to observation homes, albeit different ones. We were to stay there for two years.
In the first month at the facility, I had no one to talk to. There were no counsellors either. I would wake up alone, eat alone, sleep alone. I was miserable. I don't think we were reformed in any way. In the two years I spent there, no one asked me what had led me to do what I did.
When I was released, Abu's cousin took me to an NGO that works with kids from remand homes. The people there counselled me for nearly three months. They also taught me how to drive and I applied for a driver's licence. Today, I earn my living as a driver. My employer knows my history, but trusts me with his car.


A switch in the brain
From the psychiatrist's desk

By definition, anyone who is under 18 years of age, is a child. India is signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, according to which anyone below 18 years cannot be meted out capital punishment or life imprisonment. Psychologically and biologically too, the evolution of a child is the greatest between the age of 17 to 22 years.
"Our behaviour and functions are governed by two parts of the brain. One that is responsible for decision-making, foresight, planning and judgement. This part of the brain develops mostly at the later part of adolescence," says Achal Bhagat, senior consultant psychiatrist and psychologist at Apollo Hospital. "The other part of the brain governs sensation-seeking activities, looks out for risks and rewards, adventure, peer support and recognition and impulses. This part grows more quickly. A balance between these two parts of the brain is achieved between 18 to 20 years."

When a child becomes a man
Writer Naval Gharia on his transition

Scout's honor, the words were always there, the only difference was they now meant something more. I remember making my first girl blush, in grade 7, declaiming: "Lay your sleeping head, my love, human on my faithless arm…" during an excruciatingly boring lesson.
No, I don't remember her name or her face, and I did not know then that Auden did not like women in that way, in those days when dinosaurs were with us and sex ed wasn't.
I lie! There was sex education, of course, taught by our grade 7 advanced math teacher, a dour, thin-lipped, hooded-eyed tyrant who liked to set me up to fail: "So, let us progress beyond the square root of 625…let us try the square root of -1 Mr. Ghiara." He got mad at me because I had the answer, even to that one.
He took it out on me in sex ed, though, attempting mean revenge: "So Mr Ghiara, do you know how your parents made you?" I had no articulate answer, though I knew they helped me to think about myself every day, when I was struggling with too many hormones, and too many feelings, and too many questions. His answer was in keeping with his nature: "It was like putting a plug in a socket," and it actually made more sense than he wanted it to.
My revenge was sweeter. I told everyone in High School the Math teacher joke I made up: How many math teachers does it take to light up a bulb?
Minus one.
And of course, there was the sudden ache I felt when I looked at the girls who had just been girls until then, and now were suddenly, wonderfully different: walking down a hallway, sitting down, smoothening their skirts behind them, reaching up to tuck in a hair, just breathing. The Sanskrit love poets sang of "the vine of desire", I read much later, but back then I was just really happy they were there.
Sure, some boys don't get that about a girl or woman but how on earth do they get to a place where they can actually hurt her?