Parliament Passes Bill to Protect Children from Sexual Abuse

In May 2012, Parliament approved landmark legislation to protect children below eighteen from sexual abuse — setting up special courts for speedy trials and prescribing stringent punishment, extending up to life imprisonment, for offenders.

Winding up the debate in the Lok Sabha, Women and Child Development Minister Krishna Tirath said the Bill was gender-neutral, that it sought to protect children from sexual offences, and that the burden of proof would rest on the accused. All persons below eighteen would be treated as children, and efforts had been made to keep the Bill's provisions child-friendly, including in-camera trial of offences. Dismissing concerns about misuse, she noted that the Bill also contained provisions to deal with false complaints.

The Bill, which had earlier been cleared by the Rajya Sabha, was approved by the Lower House by voice vote.

The legislation's passage came at a moment of heightened public attention to child sexual abuse — Satyamev Jayate had devoted a widely watched episode to the subject earlier in the month, and the 2007 Women and Child Development Ministry study finding that 53% of surveyed children reported some form of sexual abuse had become a national reference point. But the law itself had been in the making since 2011, working its way through the legislative process before the cameras ever rolled.

The debate also drew familiar cross-currents. RJD's Lalu Prasad used the occasion to question why the government had not moved the Supreme Court against the Delhi High Court's decriminalization of "unnatural sex."

The Bill became the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act — India's first comprehensive law on child sexual abuse, and the framework under which such cases have been prosecuted since.

This article summarizes contemporaneous reporting, including the Indian Express' May 2012 coverage.