Blackstone stated that: ‘infancy
is a defect of understanding, and infants under the age of discretion ought not
to be punished by any criminal prosecution whatsoever.’
The Indian Penal Code, 1860,
provides that infants under the age of 7 years are completely exempted from all
criminal liability[1]
while those between the ages of 7 and 12 are exempted only if they have not
attained sufficient maturity of understanding the nature and consequences of
their act[2].
Under the provisions of IPC, if a child above the age of 7 years and below 10 years
shows sufficient maturity so as to know the nature and consequences of his
actions, he is not granted complete immunity.
However, the Juvenile Justice (Care
and Protection of Children) Act, 2000[3],
has increased the age of juvenility to 18 years and it prohibits death sentence
or life imprisonment for juveniles for the commission of any offence under the
IPC[4].
But a proviso to Section 16(1) states that: Provided that where a juvenile who
has attained the age of sixteen years has committed an offence and the Board is
satisfied that the offence committed is of so serious in nature or that his
conduct and behaviour have been such that it would not be in hi interest or in the
interest of other juvenile in a special home to send him to such special home
and that none of the other measures provided under this Act is suitable or
sufficient, the Board may order the juvenile in conflict with law to be kept in
such place of safety and in such manner as it thinks fit and shall report the
case for the order of the State Government.
While the Indian Penal Code is a
general law and Juvenile Justice Act is a special law and thus supersedes the
provisions of the IPC, in cases of grave and heinous crimes like cold blooded
murders or sexual offences, a juvenile should not be given the protection of
the special law. When the nature of crime and the manner of commission itself
indicates the level of maturity, the relaxation based on chronological age
should not be granted.
[1] Section 82
[2] Section 83
[3] Enacted following the ratification
of the Convention on the Rights of Child to protect and safeguard the interests
of children. While the earlier Act of 1986 had kept the age of males at 16 and
of females at 18 to be called child, the Act of 2000 has kept an uniform age of
18 years for both.
[4] Section 16(1)
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