Children as Victims of Crime - The Denial of Justice

Introduction Children are considered as the nation’s ‘supremely important national asset’ and its living malleable potential. The future of any nation is largely determined on how its children grow and develop. The issues relating to rights of child care and welfare have been constantly engaging attention of the universe. However, the community has developed its sensitivity towards children’s issues only during the last two decades which has brought on the national agenda issues like child abuse, child marriage and child labour.1  In India, the scenario was not much too different. With the country’s Independence nearly 50 years ago, many changes have been brought about from one Five Year Plan to another. The problems of children are multifaceted and multi-layered. They cover a wide range of fields from nutrition and education to development and protection so that they may become better human beings and healthy citizens in later years.2  Children as victims of crime — The international scenario Children all over the world continue to be victims of human rights violation — whether it is sexual exploitation of minors in the United States, bonded labour in Pakistan or child labour in India.  There is no way to enumerate thoroughly the various ways in which children around the world are economically exploited and physically mistreated. But the numbers are great and suffering widespread. Behind the hideous imagery of children beaten or sexually abused by adults, ravaged beyond their years by hard living and drug abuse on the streets, maimed by landmines or turned into killers by war, and even stricken with AIDS — is the all too common struggle against disease, hardship and family or social traditions that compromise children’s humanity or subject them to physical and emotional suffering.  Whether exploited as child labourers or prostitutes, drafted as young teenagers into armed forces, forced as young girls into a lonely life as domestic workers, deprived of an education to work on the family farm or denied adequate nutrition and health care, children need help and protection from the adult world that perpetrates most of the abuse.  According to the United Nations reports, victims of injustice and poverty have always had trouble of being heard, none has had more trouble historically than children and there are now well over a dozen countries in which conditions for children are far below the norms to be expected for the economic development.3  In many poor countries, children work to supplement meagre family income or otherwise to help the family business. Although they may not always work under the most desirable conditions, most are not being intentionally exploited by their families.  According to estimates from the International Labour Organisation, there are nearly 80 million children under 15 working as labourers, the number of children under 18 involved in prostitution exceeds two million, one million of whom are in Asia and 300000 in the United States.  “It has become increasingly obvious that many children used for labour and sexual exploitation are lured from particular social groups, rather than from the well-endowed groups power”, says the special report on the sale of children and child prostitution appointed by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.4  Further, prior to the 20th century children were for the most part regarded as inferior and subordinate to adults. Now in latter half of the century child-hood is regarded as a relatively sacred part of life among many the more affluent.   Children as victims of crime — Its dimensions Child abuse seems to have reached epidemic proportion in our country. A large number of children admitted to pediatric services suffer from non-accidental injury at the hands of their parents and caretakers. Child battering, incest, sexual molestation, verbal abuse, malnutrition and underfeeding are among the most common forms of abuse in this country. Today the hottest issue in and out of law is the protection of children from all types of abuses and exploitation. Here we will look first at the changing patterns of abusive practices including neglect and then to assess the remedial measures adopted for the prevention of child abuse and neglect.  Violence against children Each year hundreds of thousands of children are cruelly beaten by their parents, and some are even killed in the process of such harsh and irrational beating. Physical cruelty commonly takes the form of prick, punch, facial bruises, cigarette burns, head injuries and fractured bones. Gun shots and knife injuries were also reported. According to an estimated report thousands of children die each year in India due to parental assaults and many others are permanently paralysed, physically deformed or mentally retarded. The Newspapers have always reported that the babies and young children have had scalding water poured on their faces. They have been strangled, stomped, and burned with cigarettes, matches, and hot irons. They have been shut in closets for several days without food. Many times they have been beaten again and again by intoxicated, drugged, and just plain assaultive parents.5  In most cases, violence against children occurs as a result of emotional outbrusts, in which the parents may have been involved and the wrath of the father or mother may have been directed towards the children. The deterrent punishment will not serve any purpose in cases of family violence. Such type of incidents can be prevented only through the community mental health programmes aimed at the individual and family levels, in which the treatment of the assaultive parents is equally important as the treatment of the child victims.  Sexual exploitation of children Child sexual abuse is often broken down into 3 types: incestuous abuse, sexual assaults by strangers, and child prostitution. Here we are concerned with all the three types of abuses and exploitation. In case of incestuous abuse, the child is sexually abused by a parent or an elder person in similar position of trust, such as brother, relative, babysitter, step-parent or foster-parent. In conservative societies, as ours, the incest is less likely to be reported to the police because of social disgrace. The family often chooses to resolve the matter privately because they view it as a private, and not a criminal matter. From the victim’s point of view, incest may be more traumatic than a child rape by strangers, because such behaviour may be continued over a period of time and the victim found helpless to protect herself from such abuses. In addition, it may have long-term psychological effects. The victim develops an inner sense of guilt and depression which may have long-lasting effects on child’s personality development. Sometimes, the children who were sexually abused by their parents lead to a promiscuous life during adulthood, and those who find life unrealistic committed suicide or left parental home.6  Use of children by adult criminals In countries like India, a growing number of children are engaged in illegal begging, very often under the supervision of adults, who may even be the parents or guardians of the children. The adult members set certain amounts of money that must be collected by the child each day. If the ‘fix’ is not collected, the child is likely to be subjected to physical cruelties to ensure his or her sincerety in the profession.  One of the most traumatic aspects of child begging in this country is that there are many professional begging families and criminal gangs, operating in different parts of the country, who kidnap by force or deceitful means very young children for begging or other illegal purposes. During the 1960s we have witnessed a number of criminal gangs who were engaged in such malpractices. The professional beggars very well know what kinds of begging are most productive, such as exhibiting deformities in the body. With that object many more kidnapped boys and girls were maimed by these criminals in order to facilitate the gainful begging. In 1959 the Indian Penal Code was amended and a new Sec. 363A was inserted with more deterrent punishment to meet the challenges of such a new threat to the children.7  The menace of child labour There is a general consensus that India has the largest child labour force in the world where little hands and nimble fingers are constantly occupied in a variety of chores, bending over tasks they are incapable of performing. These are major child labour centres where they are brutally exploited.  The cramped, unhygienic and unsafe surroundings of factories where children are forced to work, comprise a world of terror. Sivakasi is a classic example. Some 50,000 children, comprising half the number of employed literally play with fire every minute of their lives. Their ages range from 3½ to 15 years and they work for as long as 12 hours continuously at wages as low as Rs. 2/- to 8/- per day, depending on the individual output.  In the glass factories of Ferozabad in Uttar Pradesh which produces bulbs, glass jars and containers, chandeliers beads and bangles, the children at work total 50,000. Barefoot, the labour are close to the furnace maintained at a temperature of 14000º C. In the pollution of soot fumes and dust, they look like machines with movements that are mechanical. They are potential victims of lung disease.  Bhiwandi is another area of child exploitation. The 15,000 children employed in the local powerlooms work in 12 hours shifts and some even for a 24 hour stretch. The diamond industry in Surat employs nearly 50,000 child labourers. Diamond-cutting and polishing skills can be acquired by children as young as ten.  The export-oriented carpet industry in Palamau, Mirzapur, Varanasi and Allahabad employ some 1.5 lakh children. And an undetermined number of children also work in bidi-making in Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. The list in both organised and unorganised sectors is endless.  It is pertinent to note that more than 80% of working children belong to the SCs and Tribes who, in turn, constitute 90% of bonded labour in the country. They are poor peasants or agricultural labourers who live in areas of scarcity owning a little land that has no access to irrigation facilities. In a situation of drought their problems are accentuated, and they migrate to cities or centres of industry. In fact, over 75% of children of migrants are workers.8  The Girl child victims Problem of the girl-child is another long neglected area, marked by deep rooted gender bias prevailing in the country which calls for immediate attention. Despite the existence of various constitutional safeguards and a National Policy for Children 1974 to support the girl-child, she is never recognised as a separate entity. Naturally, special attention is needed to assure her the right to develop to her full potential. In the action plan for SAARC, emphasis has been laid on survival and protection of the girl-child and safe motherhood, overall development of the girl-child and special protection for vulnerable girl-children placed in difficult circumstances and belonging to special groups.9  For the prevention of female foeticide and infanticide widely prevalent in the country, an Act has been passed and efforts are being made to reduce infant mortality rate to less than 60 per thousand live births and under 5 mortality rate to less than 10 by the year 2000 and to virtually eliminate the gender disparities in mortality rate.  But all these efforts pale into insignificance when we look at the enormity of the problem of exploitation of the girl-child in flesh trade.  Protection of child from criminal exploitation — The Constitutional and statutory safeguards After independence, the State has become fully conscious of its responsibility towards children. Consequently, this consciousness is reflected in some of the constitutional provisions passed for protecting the rights and well-being of children. India’s abiding interest in the welfare of children is an expression of the country’s commitment to the welfare of its single most populous group — a commitment enshrined in the preamble and various other Articles of the Constitution. There are several provisions in the Constitution which are concerned with the welfare and well-being of children. To mention a few :  Article 15 (3) enables the State to make special provisions. Article 23 prohibits the traffic in human beings and forced labour in all its forms. Article 24 prohibits employment of children below the age of 14 years in hazardous jobs. Article 37 (e) makes it a duty of the State to prevent the children from entering into jobs unsuited to their age. Article 39 (f) recommends the protection of childhood against exploitation and moral and material abandonment. Article 45 directs the State to provide free and compulsory education to all children upto 14 years of age. Apart from the above constitutional provisions several legislations have been passed from time to time for the protection of the children from criminal exploitation though not with much success in combating the child exploitation. The Indian Penal Code, Child Marriage Restraint Act, Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, Juvenile Justice Act etc. are some of the important legislations which aim at not only protecting the children from criminal exploitation but also to reform and rehabilitate the destitute, delinquent children as victims of the social conditions.  What is to be done In India, large bodies of legislation exist to protect children from curelty, exploitation, corruption, indulgence in smoking or alcohol and regulate their employment in various capacities. The children in need of special care and protection may be committed to the care of a fit person, which may be the local authority. Offences against children may be prosecuted on the same footing as an ordinary offence against the adults. To protect the girl child from her own inexperience, the law sets a minimum age below which she cannot give her consent for sexual contact.  Apart from punitive approaches adopted under the Indian Penal Code, the Juvenile Justice Act defines situations in which official intervention in a family on a child’s behalf is justified. In serious cases of abuse and neglect, the Juvenile Board awards custody of the child is placed temporarily in a juvenile home. However, the ultimate goal is to reunite the family. Counselling with parents and related psychotherapeutic measures are generally of vital importance in the treatment of child victims.  A ‘soft state’ naturally becomes an exploitative state in respect of women, children and the disabled. How else would one explain the emergence of 20 million child labourers, two million street-children, 100 million school drop-outs, 40 million children suffering from avoidable debilitating illnesses and several million sexually abused and robbed of their childhood by adult intransigence. Unlike the adults, children cannot be expected to know their rights, to seek the enforcement through official channels or even to protest against adult exploiters if there are not other sensitive adults struggling for them. It is against this sense of helplessness and against an increasingly insensitive administration that we have to think of alternative strategies to give India’s 300 million children a better deal at least in the next millennium.10  Unfortunately, there is much violation of rights by those who have to safeguard the rights, e.g. the State and its regulatory personnel such as the police and those incharge of remand homes. Even parents are guilty of this, perhaps even in the name of protection. Sometimes laws perpetuate more injustice than justice. Violation of rights can occur not merely by commission but also by omission e.g. relevant and useful education is not provided according to the needs and situations or the obverse of not providing necessary sexual and other education in the most effective and suitable manner where it is most needed.  Mr. Justice Venkatachallaiah, Chairman of the Human Rights Commission, always states that if society takes care of the rights of girl children, the right of all others follow automatically. This is as profound as Mahatma Gandhi’s statement about the benefits accruing to a family by educating a single woman.11  Along with the physical exploitation the psychological damage to children forms another unfortunate story. They have no proper childhood, nor can they hope for a meaningful adulthood. Denied love, physical care, nutrition, social stimulus, moral inputs or opportunity for education and advancement in life, they are more or less condemned in prison-like environments. There is little joy in their looks, sparkle in their eyes or smile on their lips. They do not know what they are missing for, their young years occupied in monotonous and repetitive tasks that do not equip them with any useful skills for later life. They are vulnerable only because they are docile and innocent.  As a tragic consequence we have in our amidst millions of ill-fed, ill-housed, ill-educated, mal-nourished, physically handicapped, mentally retarded, abused and neglected children who are in need of special help and care. Although the Constitution forbids discrimination as between citizens on the basis of sex the true equality is not achieved even 50 years after independence. The female child is still discriminated in education, freedom of movement and medical treatment. The discrimination starts even at foetus stage with the sex-linked abortion.  The following suggestions are being made to combat the criminal exploitation of children more effectively.  A full fledged National Commission should be established to implement the rights of child and also to halt the criminal exploitation of child. Improvement of our system of justice to ensure timely detection of the cases of child abuse and neglect. In all cases of abuse of child heavy compensation should be paid to the victims as of right. Establishment of a child crisis centre in each district to ensure early positive response to the needs of children. There should be change in the social outlook and social change towards children and their development. The Laws concerning combating the criminal exploitation of the child should be implemend more strictly and the administration should take up stringent measures to punish the violators. Heavy punishments including the death sentence should be inflicted against the criminals commiting the acts of violation against children. The State must enforce compulsory education, the only instrument by which the State can effectively remove children from labour force. The State should regard education as a legal duty, not merely as a right. It should stand as the ultimate guardian of children, protecting them against both parents and society. Need has come for the creation of more all-girl schools the greater use of women teachers and the initiation of campaigns by social workers to persuade parents to keep their daughters in schools. A global fund for the victim children should be created.

Author Name: Dr. M. Sammaiah