A culprit who brutally raped a girl in Delhi in the Nirbhaya case is getting ready to come out without fear.
This is happening because of the legal consideration given to a 'minor', which he was not.
The crime he committed was not something that a child would have done. A boy who sees the rape of the Delhi girl in a bus would have reacted in two ways: if he had courage with goodness of childhood, he would have fought to save the girl, or he would have got terrified by that sight and escaped.
This is not what happened in that bus that day. He repeated the crime that adults committed with the same brutality.
He also assisted in destroying evidence. What benefit of childhood does he deserve? The children and youth we see around us today are not the kind who were there when these laws were framed. Children’s nature and behaviour have changed. People committing crime escaping because of the sole reason that they are minors as per law is causing damage to society.
What paves the way to such laws is the good intention that if a child unexpectedly commits a crime under the pressure of circumstances, he should not become a criminal for life and society should not brand him as one.
However, what we are seeing today is crime syndicates recruiting children for organised crime to take advantage of such concessions in law.
Mainly it is the drug mafia that subvert law by misusing children to traffic narcotics. This sight of convicts escaping punishment even if they are caught will lead the society to a big tragedy.
Whether a minor, caught for committing a crime, should be prosecuted or not should not be decided only on the basis of how much time has passed since the child’s birth. Prosecution measures should be thought of only after considering his circumstances, mental and physical growth and knowledge of crime. This does not mean that the legal system should not consider the age of the person committing a crime, instead it should not become helpless when criminals turn age into a shield.
When opportunities to counsel minors who get involved in criminal activities come before us, we get to see real children and youth and criminals hiding in immature bodies.
Sometimes to change a minor who has committed a crime by mistake, just one question would be enough: What happened to you son? But it is not like that in other cases.
We will soon realise the danger of investigating officers and the legal system letting off the culprit (as per law such people should not be even called culprits) in a case of rape and murder of a girl in Delhi in the same way they handle a child who throws a stone and damages the eye of the person who came at him with a stick while pelting stones at a mango tree.
Meanwhile, rules that have to be altered must be changed, because the time has come to examine childhood.
(The writer is an advocate at Kerala High Court)
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