From Classrooms to Courtrooms: The Silent Surge of Juvenile Delinquency

The culture we consume is the culture we create. Childhood, the very formative stage of an individual’s life, is often symbolised by the moulding of a pot. Too much water, or too much heat, and the vessel breaks. Childhood, too, works on a very similar balance of nurturing and protection. 

However, as we transition into the age of digitalisation, with the hands that once held playbooks now being replaced with mobiles, a haunting reality of the generation in the making stares back at us.

According to the NCRB data of the year 2021, India has seen a 4.7%rise in juvenile apprehension, as against the previous year. The majority of the juveniles apprehended belonged to the 16-18 year age group. 

The infamous Pune Porsche case, with a 17-year-old minor ramming the car and claiming the lives of two innocents, led to a massive uproar as the minor escaped trial as an adult, reigniting the debate around the Juvenile Justice Act and bringing the rising juvenile delinquency into the limelight. Should minors, with cognitive capacity and maturity as expected of an adult, be allowed to get away with crimes? 

A SILENT CRISIS?

The Pune Porsche incident, unfortunately, is not a one-in-a-million case but the dawning reality. According to the NCRB data, in 2022, nearly half of the juveniles apprehended in India were arrested for violent crimes.

The astonishing case of a 13-year-old boy, charged in Hubli, Karnataka, for stabbing a 15-year-old friend, over an argument on chips, a 9th standard student murdering a 10th standard senior in Ahmedabad, a student carrying a revolver in Uttarakhand, in a tiffin box, with the intention to shoot the teacher, force us to debate the growing concern of rising aggression amongst children.

From petty quarrels to classrooms once meant for growth and learning, now turning into crime scenes, show us the harsh reality that it is no longer an isolated incident, but rather, has slowly crept its way into the societal fabric. 

The rising cases of aggression and delinquency bring the focus yet again on the interplay of psychological, social, and environmental factors that inevitably impact their transitional period from childhood to adulthood. 

Brain Development: The adolescent brain undergoes substantial changes in the formative stages, including synaptic pruning, improving the brain circuits for higher-order thinking, planning, risk assessment and hypersensitivity.

According to Jean Piaget’s theory, cognitive abilities develop in stages. In the formative stage from age 11, children start thinking about abstract concepts and thus form the cognitive thinking pattern. While the limbic system becomes hypersensitive, the prefrontal cortex is still maturing, making individuals prone to taking impulsive actions. 

Social Media: In the age of digitalisation, with the growing presence of individuals, particularly children, on social media platforms, and an abject dearth of proper mechanisms to control viewership, children are today being exposed to age-inappropriate content. The prevalence of illicit content, including violence, and the use of vulgar language, creates an impression on the young minds, normalising such behaviours.

The constant glorification of aggression and the innate need to seek peer validation have inevitably made children more susceptible to delinquent behaviour. 

With the shift in the societal structure and normalisation of cyberbullying, substance abuse, and the use of abusive language through pre-conceived notions that only such actions make an individual desirable, under rising peer pressure, a child’s judgement is further clouded, blurring the line between right and wrong. 

THE LEGAL LENS

The legal framework in India has been through a series of amendments to counter the rising juvenile delinquency.

The Juvenile Justice Act 2000, which focused upon rehabilitation over criminal punishment, underwent a massive overhaul, shifting towards a more punitive and crime-controlled approach, post the heinous Nirbhaya Rape Case of 2012, in which an accused barely months away from turning 18, escaped adult trial, ultimately leading to amendments and passing of the Juvenile Justice Act of 2015.

The Juvenile Justice Act 2015, incorporating the same amendments, established a dual system of a punitive approach within a care framework, focusing on protection, development and adopting child-friendly policies.

The new law's foundation is built upon the framework of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, ratified by India in 1992, building on the principles: 

1. Any child up to the age of eighteen is presumed to be innocent of any criminal intent. 

2. All decisions must prioritise the child’s interest and ensure development to their full potential. 

3. A child is to be put in institutions only as a last resort, after all the other options have been exhausted. 

A crucial departure from the previous act, which has been the sore point of controversy, is the establishment of the Juvenile Justice Board and the powers granted to the board to classify children between the age group of 16-18 years to be tried as adults, after preliminary assessment, if the crime can be classified under ‘heinous crimes’. 

If satisfied, the Juvenile Board then has the authority to transfer the case to the Children’s Court to pursue the trial as an adult. Beyond such strong measures, the act also encompasses rehabilitation as the foundational basis.

Focus upon establishments of institutions such as aftercare programs, special homes, and changing the terminology from ‘juvenile offender’ to ‘child in conflict with law’ marks the reinforcement of the foundational principle of rehabilitation over criminal punishment. 

Earlier, the Supreme Court maintained a softer, welfare-oriented approach, while firmly adhering to the belief that every individual, under the age of 18, must be treated as a child, regardless of the gravity of the crime.

The adoption of a protectionist approach, by the Supreme Court, is observed in key judgements including the Salil Bali vs Union Of India(2013),  and Dr. Subramaniam Swami vs Raju(2014), reinstating the constitutional validity of the Juvenile Justice Act of 2000, and stressing on the need to keep 18 as the age of juvenility, which is in line with the UNCRC international law.

However, with the rising cases of Juvenile Delinquency, the courts have observed a shift in stance, particularly in the Om Prakash vs State of Rajasthan(2002), stating that an accused of a heinous crime could not seek shelter in the garb of being a minor.

In Parag Bharati vs the State of Uttar Pradesh (2016), the court stated that the Juvenile Justice Act could not be used as a shield to dodge the arms of law and shall only be applicable after a prima facie evaluation. 

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

While the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015 was a positive move, recognising the complexities of child crimes, however, the lack of equipped policy reforms and effective societal change brings the need for a more exhaustive and comprehensive approach into the limelight.

Legal Reforms: The current division between denoting an individual as a child or an adult under fixed binaries tends to overlook the most crucial age of adolescence. The legal terminology must be further shifted and expanded to accommodate the third binary: Adolescent. Further, India must explicitly adhere to institutionalisation as a last resort.

Inspired by the Norway model, focusing on restorative justice and expansive rehabilitation centres, India should prioritise community-based solutions rather than solely banking on punitive detention.

In line with the United Kingdom’s Youth Offending Team, India could constitute centralised youth offending services, working in collaboration with the educational institutions, emphasising media literacy, providing counselling and individual care plans, focusing on prevention programmes and mentoring.

Social Media Governance: To enhance social media governance and accountability of social media platforms, India must first introduce proportionate penalties against platforms to assign responsibility.  In the fines, similar to those in the EU, the defendant’s damages must be fixed proportionate to their income.

The DPDP Act, while it focuses on strong data privacy governance, lacks in content regulation and systematic mitigation, reflecting the shortcomings in our system. Inspired by the UK and the establishment of Ofcom, the independent regulating organisation, India could follow a similar approach to counter the ills of social media.

CONCLUSION

While the legal reforms and the shift of the judiciary towards a crime-sensitive approach are a step in the right direction, they will only scratch the surface. However, a transformation in the truest sense could only be achieved when society stops turning a blind eye and categorising such cases as mere ‘spurts of violence’, and actively positions itself as the beacon of change.

The popular Netflix series, Adolescence, did not just critique the legal standpoint and the limitations, but was a glaring reflection of the faultlines that lie in our societal setup, where aggression and vulgarity have been glorified to an extent that it is projected as the new normal.

The naive, young, impressionable minds are being exposed to content that stems from this very belief, and the lack of acknowledgement of this silent crisis does not just put the present at peril, but fails the very future in the making. 

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BY ANANYA SHARMA

TEAM GEOSTRATA

info@thegeostrata.com