The Union Cabinet has cleared the proposal to try juveniles between 16 -18 years old as adults. Ignoring the recommendations of the Parliamentary Standing Committee, the government has decided to go ahead with the proposal.

Juveniles can now be subject to the Indian Penal Code, but only if they have committed a particularly heinous crime.

The demand for a revision of the Juvenile Justice Act has been on the cards for some time now. The gruesome Nirbhaya murder case, where one of the culprits was a minor, brought the issue to the fore.

In the light of such brutality, should ‘minors’ in their late teens be exempt from the harshest punishments?

No Global Template Yet

There is no global template when it comes to heinous crimes and minors. In the UK, 17-year-olds can be tried as adults in certain cases and in the USA, 20 out of 50 states allow minors to be tried as adults in capital crimes.

France, on the other hand, has special juvenile courts to deal with serious crimes committed by minors.

Even the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, an international treaty India signed and ratified in December 1992, allows every country to determine the legal age limit. The Convention also says “No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

The issue then is not merely legal, but also a moral one.

Question of Consequences

The arbitrariness of the legal age for adulthood becomes a particularly sensitive issue when it comes to brutal crimes.

Why should a murderer or a rapist who is 16 or 17 get away with three years in prison for a crime which carries a severe sentence for an adult? With an increasing number of violent crimes against women and children being committed by minors, punishing them to the full extent of the law may serve multiple ends.

1. Victims and their families may get some measure of solace if their attackers are punished, no matter their age.

2. Currently, the diminished sentences for juveniles are unlikely to act as a deterrent and trying them as adults may lead to a drop in the crime rates.

Organised crime for example, often uses minors because even if they are caught, the light sentence is almost an incentive to not ‘tell’ on their bosses.

Reform Over Retribution

There are also several arguments, many of them cogent, against treating youngsters as adults.

1. Just as minors are not allowed to vote, by the same reasoning they are treated differently when it comes to crime as well - they are not seen as capable of rational thought. Can we really attribute motive to a 16-year-old? Can we treat them as adults when it comes to crime, but not in any other aspect of their lives?

2. The aim of any justice system is not merely to punish, but also to reform. If minors are treated as adult criminals, spend years in jail, it will likely send them only deeper into criminal activity.

There is also the larger issue of deterrence. Does harsher punishment really lead to less crime? There isn’t any conclusive evidence either way.

Where do you stand? Leave your views in the comments section.