Merely watching child porn doesn't make it an offence: Madras HC

Chennai: The present day children are 'grappling' with the serious issue of watching porn and instead of punishing them, the society must be "mature enough" to educate them, the Madras High Court has said.

The court also quashed proceedings against a 28-year-old man, charged with downloading on his mobile phone, pornographic content involving children, saying the Information Technology Act, 2000 does not make mere watching such material an offence.

"In order to constitute an offence under Section 67-B of Information Technology Act, 2000, the accused person must have published, transmitted, created material depicting children in sexual explicit act or conduct. A careful reading of this provision does not make watching a child pornography, per se, an offence under Section 67-B of Information Technology Act, 2000," Justice N Anand Venkatesh said in an order on Thursday.

Even though the said section of the IT Act has been widely worded, it does not cover a case where a person has merely downloaded in his electronic gadget, a child pornography and he has watched the same without doing anything more, the court said.

Admittedly, there were two videos, involving minor boys, downloaded and available in the mobile phone of the petitioner and it was neither published nor transmitted to others and it was within the private domain of the petitioner.
The court, however, expressed concern over children watching pornography.

Viewing pornography can have negative consequences on teenagers down the line, affecting both their psychological and physical well being.

"The Generation Z Children are grappling with this serious problem and instead of damning and punishing them, the society must be mature enough to properly advice and educate them and try to counsel them to get rid of that addiction. The education must start from the school level since exposure to adult material starts at that stage itself," the judge said.

The court advised the petitioner to attend counselling, if he was still afflicted with this addiction.

"This Court hopes that the petitioner will listen to the advice and get rid of the addiction for a happy and healthy future. Quashing of the criminal proceedings by itself will not help the petitioner and the petitioner has to help himself by getting rid of the addiction," the judge added.

"In the light of the above discussion, the continuation of the proceedings against the petitioner will amount to abuse of process of Court. That apart, it will be a stumbling block for the petitioner's career in future. Therefore, this Court is inclined to quash the proceedings" on the file of the Sessions Judge, Mahila Neethi Mandram (Fast Track Court), Tiruvallur District, the court ordered.

The judge said porn addiction, like other substances or "things" that people can become addicted to, can be understood through principles of "operant conditioning".

"This is where a certain behaviour, watching porn in this case, is "reinforced", or rewarded, which in turn makes you want to do it again (and again). Lots of different things can be reinforcing, and thus influence our behaviour, but porn can be especially reinforcing because the reward taps into a very basic instinctual drive - sex."

"Therefore, it is very easy to become addicted to porn - it is accessing a fundamental (and very enjoyable) natural drive. It is also much easier to obtain than going out and finding a "mate" to fulfill this drive," the court noted.