Instead of stricter punitive measures for child sexual abuse, there is need to focus on prevention of crimes by enhancing budgetary allocation for the Centre’s Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS), which aims to provide a safety net for children and protect them from falling prey to crimes, said activists.
Proper monitoring
Civil society organisations also pointed out that key posts lying vacant in the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) need to be filled to ensure proper monitoring of implementation of various child-related legislations.
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“The government has not made serious investments in the ICPS. The little it has invested goes into adoption centres and child care institutions. There is a preventive component under which there should be child protection committees at village, block and district levels, but there is no budget set aside for these units. They have no support persons who are supposed to be experts and are meant to take up awareness campaigns, act as watchdogs in villages and play an important role in preventing crimes against children,” said Bharti Ali, co-founder of Haq – Centre for Child Rights.
Intimidation of survivor
Ms. Ali emphasised the need to provide witness protection before trial so that a survivor is not intimidated into keeping silent.
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The ICPS is a Centrally-sponsored programme for child protection being implemented across the country from 2009. Its aim is to put in place a safety net of structures, services and trained personnel for protection of children in difficult circumstances.
Despite 11.9% increase in allocation compared to the year before, ₹725 crore was allotted under the scheme in 2018-2019 — a mere 0.05 % of the total budget.
Analysis by Haq shows that within the 2018-19 budgetary allocation for children, funds set aside for their protection were the lowest (1.48%) as compared to education (69.37%), development (25.25%) and health (3.90%).
Uma Subramanian of Mumbai-based Aarambh India too talked about improving ICPS implementation and need to sensitise adults who are custodians of children.
Focus on human resource
“We need to focus on human resource for ICPS. There is no commitment on that front. There is need to talk to adults in the lives of children to prevent sexual crimes. We need to speak to legal and non-legal custodians of children — parents, teachers, caretakers, institutional staff and police personnel — because the general pattern is that most of these crimes happen within the household.”
Significantly, the NCPCR, which is mandated to monitor the implementation of several child-related laws, including Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, Juvenile Justice (JJ) Act, and Child Labour (Prohibition and Prevention) Amendment Act, has had three of its seven key positions lying vacant since the appointment of the latest panel in 2015.
Child sex abuse survey
Child rights activists have also long been demanding a survey to assess the magnitude of child sex abuse.
The last such survey was conducted in 2007 by non-government organisation Prayas and commissioned by the government. It revealed that 52% of children had faced some kind of abuse.
“It has been 10 years since the last survey. In the meantime, we have had important legislations such as the JJ Act and the POCSO Act. We need to map the impact of these major legal reforms,” said Amod Kanth, founder of non-government organisation Prayas and a former Deputy Commissioner of Police.