85% of Child Rape Cases pending; Reluctance of parents to bring their victimized children to court.

With many development schemes being introduced for a brighter future; the future itself seems petrified. A shocking revelation by NCRB (National Crime Records Bureau) stated that 223 million children (150million girls/ 73 million boys) under 18 years of age in India experienced rape or other forms of sexual violence in 2013.

Law is of paramount importance in any country, as it assures safety and justice to the citizens but analysing the statistics revealed by NCRB, 85% of sexual offences against children continue to be pending in courts and only 15.3% of cases saw completion of trials in 2013.

The worst scenario is that the parents rather than standing for the rights of their children hesitate to bring their victimized children to court which becomes the prime reason for cases lingering on for years. The reasons behind the escapism is the fact that the parents get unsure of their child’s identity getting revealed (anonymity)  and frightened by the incident the child many a times ends up giving conflicting testimonies which becomes a concern for the parents.

The tortured child has already gone through hell and then facing the culprit yet again kills their innocence and morale. The biggest reason according to experts, including lawyers, activists and child counsellors is the unsuccessful efforts of government to bring in strict laws and the initiatives taken lack required resources to enable implementation by the judiciary.

Even after bringing in a “stringent” law such as ‘The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POCSO)’, there has been a shocking hike in sex crimes against children. Under Section 28 of the POCSO Act it is mandatory for the state government to establish “a court of session to be special court in every district” while section 32 mandates appointment of “special public prosecutors”, but the fact remains that district court complexes across the country are still awaiting a dedicated sessions court for POCSO and independent special public prosecutors as envisaged under the Act.

Child rights lawyer Anant Asthana correctly pointed out that “Supreme Court has observed in its report on national court management system that government legislates but doesn’t provide financial allocation. So far the trend has been to meet any concern by bringing a new law. But if there is no allocation how can new magistrates be appointed, courtrooms be built and prosecutors recruited?”

Moreover, the judges who have dealt with cases of sexual offence against children, have experienced that the court ambience can’t be termed friendly or comfortable for children. Even after knowing the animity of the crime the rights of accused need to be respected and due process needs to be followed. The parents get worried about their kid’s mental health because while giving the witness, their child has to face the accused again, reminding the kid about the trauma he/she faced. Looking at their age, proper counsellors and special prosecutors are mandatory for fair trials.

CPP strictly opposes the leniency of authorities in bringing required laws into practice, as crime against children shows an elevating graph and given the scenario of the crime rate it  won’t be wrong to say that the “future of the country seems dark”. CPP requests the government to consider the plea of small innocent victims and provide children centric courtrooms and special prosecutors for a better and speedy trial.