NOIDA: Uttar Pradesh has not had a Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) or a district child welfare committee (CWC) for a month now. Terms of both ended in December 2019 and, as a stopgap measure, the government asked district magistrates to nominate judicial magistrates who would take up the duties of the JJB and ADM or SDM-level officials who would fill in for the CWC. On Wednesday, the Allahabad high court issued a notice to the state government on the order.
A bench of justices Biswanath Somadder and Yogendra Kumar Srivastava, hearing a petition against the order, asked “when the State proposes to constitute valid Juvenile Justice Boards and Child Welfare Committees in accordance with the provisions of the relevant statute.” The next hearing, by when the government has to respond, is on February 12.
An official source said, many juveniles have been lodged in observation homes over the past month since the JJB’s term expired. Many bail hearings also could not be taken up. In Gautam Budh Nagar, two juveniles – aged seven and eight – accused of raping a three-year-old, had to be produced in Surajpur court. Many like them have been.
In the absence of JJBs and CWCs, juvenile offenders are being produced in regular courtrooms – which the legal fraternity and social activists said was “against the spirit” of the Juvenile Justice Act (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015. “The Act is meant to protect children – it says when juveniles are produced, no police officer in uniform should be present. In court rooms, not only are hundreds of police personnel present but also hardened criminals,” said advocate Vibhav Mishra, who assisted senior advocate Anurag Khanna in the case.
In Gautam Budh Nagar, sub-divisional magistrate of Dadri, Anand Shrinetra, has been asked to take up the role of CWC while the additional chief judicial magistrate has been nominated to adjudicate cases involving juveniles, district magistrate BN Singh told TOI.
A bench of justices Biswanath Somadder and Yogendra Kumar Srivastava, hearing a petition against the order, asked “when the State proposes to constitute valid Juvenile Justice Boards and Child Welfare Committees in accordance with the provisions of the relevant statute.” The next hearing, by when the government has to respond, is on February 12.
An official source said, many juveniles have been lodged in observation homes over the past month since the JJB’s term expired. Many bail hearings also could not be taken up. In Gautam Budh Nagar, two juveniles – aged seven and eight – accused of raping a three-year-old, had to be produced in Surajpur court. Many like them have been.
In the absence of JJBs and CWCs, juvenile offenders are being produced in regular courtrooms – which the legal fraternity and social activists said was “against the spirit” of the Juvenile Justice Act (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015. “The Act is meant to protect children – it says when juveniles are produced, no police officer in uniform should be present. In court rooms, not only are hundreds of police personnel present but also hardened criminals,” said advocate Vibhav Mishra, who assisted senior advocate Anurag Khanna in the case.
In Gautam Budh Nagar, sub-divisional magistrate of Dadri, Anand Shrinetra, has been asked to take up the role of CWC while the additional chief judicial magistrate has been nominated to adjudicate cases involving juveniles, district magistrate BN Singh told TOI.
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