‘Juvenile homes do little to rehabilitate’

Struggling with poor infrastructure and harsh conditions inside Delhi’s juvenile homes do little to rehabilitate “law offender kid”, Juvenile Rights Watch Group says.

According to NGOs, the Juvenile Justice Act (JJA), under which juvenile lawbreakers are tried and kept in the special homes, was meant to rehabilitate them and facilitate their reintegration with the normal life once they are released. But the lack of infrastructure, the unsympathetic attitude of officials and less of farsightedness have failed the purpose.

“Officers are overburdened, unskilled and often unable to handle children offenders,” said Amitav Khurana, a lawyer who specialises in juvenile justice. He headed several committees appointed by the Courts to monitor the workings of juvenile homes in Delhi.

“These homes do not have even the basic understanding of the psychosocial care, as prescribed in the juvenile justice act,” Kumar said.

“There are no welfare officers at most of the correctional centre. As per the law, there needs to be one officer for every 25 children. Most of these welfare officials are employed on a contract basis and are hardly paid,” said an official of the department of social welfare.

“Very often the rooms inside theses houses are overcrowded as children off index the prescribed number of children to be kept in a room,” said a member of HAQ Center for Child Rights.

The Magazine Road rehabilitation home, which served as arms and ammunition warehouse during the British rule, was home for recently released most notorious youngest offender involved in the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old Nirbhaya in Delhi.

In the aftermath of the Delhi gang-rape case and the involvement of the said juvenile, there was renewed attention on the efficacy of the juvenile justice system in India because of the maximum sentence the boy could receive. A debate over lowering the age of adult criminal responsibility from 18 to 16 years followed.

However, keeping aside, all round hue and cry for the stringent punishment for juvenile involved in Nirbhaya case, India’s highest court set him free citing the absence of law to hold him anymore.