Overview of the Juvenile Justice System’s Current State
As of October 31, 2023, more than 55% of cases pending before 362 Juvenile Justice Boards across India, according to a recent report by the India Justice Report.
The report, titled “Juvenile Justice and Children in Conflict with the Law: A Study of Capacity at the Frontlines,” revealed that from November 1, 2022, to October 31, 2023, there were 100,904 cases filed against minors.
Out of these, only 45,097 cases were resolved by the Juvenile Justice Boards.
Established under the Juvenile Justice Act of 2015, these boards are mandated to address issues concerning children accused of crimes. Each board must include a metropolitan or judicial magistrate with a minimum of three years of experience, along with two social workers, one of whom must be female.
The study was based on responses to 250 Right to Information requests, highlighting the lack of a centralized public database on these boards.
The India Justice Report posed 16 questions regarding the juvenile justice system’s capacity to various state authorities, receiving over 500 responses from 28 states and two Union Territories, covering 530 districts.
According to the report, despite the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) Act being enacted a decade ago, systemic issues persist, including inadequate inter-agency coordination and insufficient data-sharing.
While 92% of districts in India have established Juvenile Justice Boards, 24% of these boards are not fully staffed, and 30% lack a legal services clinic, which is a requirement set by the National Legal Services Authority.
Only three regions—Odisha, Sikkim, and Jammu and Kashmir—have fully constituted boards.
The study also noted that 30% of the 436 authorized positions for social workers in 218 Special Juvenile Police Units remain unfilled as of October 31, 2023.
Additionally, 15 states reported having only 28 medical officers across 128 institutions, with just 82 full-time superintendents overseeing these facilities.
The states affected include Assam, Delhi, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Maharashtra, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, Sikkim, Telangana, Tripura, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal.
Furthermore, 14 states and Union Territories, including Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Punjab, Sikkim, Telangana, Tripura, and West Bengal, lack designated Places of Safety for children aged 16 to 18 accused of serious offenses.
The Juvenile Justice Act of 2015 permits minors over 16 to be treated as adults if charged with a serious crime. If convicted, they are placed in an observation home until they turn 21 before being transferred to a prison, but they cannot receive a death sentence or life imprisonment without parole.
According to the report, only Goa has reported having an Observation Home in both its districts, while Rajasthan has 40 across 42 districts, and Mizoram and Maharashtra have more Observation Homes than districts.
Justice Madan B Lokur, a former Supreme Court judge and chairperson of the United Nations Internal Justice Council, expressed concern over the findings, noting that nearly a quarter of the boards are not fully operational a decade after the Act’s implementation.
He emphasized the need for a systematic approach to gather and share data on Juvenile Justice, highlighting the issues with the current reliance on sporadic data from RTIs.
