Orders Against a Child Found in Conflict With Law

In one line

The Board has seven orders ending in a special home for up to three years, may add five directions to any of them, must transfer the case where the preliminary assessment says the child should be tried as an adult, and no child may be sentenced to death or to life imprisonment without the possibility of release.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: section 21 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 provides that no child in conflict with law shall be sentenced to death or for life imprisonment without the possibility of release, for any such offence, either under the provisions of that Act or under the Indian Penal Code or any other law for the time being in force.

Section 18(1), when it applies

The Board may make one of the seven orders where it is satisfied on inquiry that:

• a child, irrespective of age, has committed a petty offence; or
• a child, irrespective of age, has committed a serious offence; or
• a child below sixteen has committed a heinous offence; or
• a child above sixteen has committed a heinous offence and the Board has, after preliminary assessment under section 15, disposed of the matter.

The fourth limb was inserted by Act 23 of 2021 with effect from 1 September 2022. Before that the sub-section did not say in terms what the Board could order where it had conducted a preliminary assessment and decided to keep the case. The amendment closed the gap.

The seven orders

(a) Allow the child to go home after advice or admonition, following appropriate inquiry and counselling to the child and to his parents or guardian;

(b) direct him to participate in group counselling and similar activities;

(c) order him to perform community service under the supervision of an organisation or institution, or a specified person, persons or group of persons identified by the Board;

(d) order the child or his parents or guardian to pay a fine. The proviso: where the child is working, it shall be ensured that the provisions of any labour law in force are not violated;

(e) direct him to be released on probation of good conduct and placed under the care of any parent, guardian or fit person, on a bond with or without surety, for not more than three years;

(f) direct him to be released on probation of good conduct and placed under the care and supervision of any fit facility, for not more than three years;

(g) direct him to be sent to a special home for a period not exceeding three years, for reformative services including education, skill development, counselling, behaviour modification therapy and psychiatric support. The proviso: if his conduct and behaviour have been such that it would not be in his interest or in the interest of the other children housed there, the Board may send him to a place of safety.