POCSO Act Amendment: Centre Approves Ordinance With Death Penalty For Child Rapists
According to the amendment, a death penalty has been provided for rapists of girls below 12 years of age.
New Delhi, April 21: The Centre on Saturday approved an ordinance to amend the Protection of Children From Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act to award death sentence to the rapists of children below the age of 12. In a meeting, the Cabinet gave its nod for an Ordinance to be promulgated to provide for stringent punishment for perpetrators of rape particularly of girls below 16 years age and below 12 years of age. According to the amendment, a death penalty has been provided for rapists of girls below 12 years of age.
The Cabinet also decided to put in place measures for speedy investigation and trial of rape cases. In case of rape of a girl under 16 years, minimum punishment increased from 10 years to 20 years, extendable to life imprisonment; minimum 20 years’ imprisonment or life imprisonment for rape of a girl under 12 years has been provided in the Ordinance.
The minimum punishment in case of rape of women has been increased from the rigorous imprisonment of 7 years to 10 years, extendable to life imprisonment; in case of gang rape of a girl below 12 years, punishment will be life imprisonment or death sentence.
According to an ANI report, the Centre submitted its report while responding to a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Advocate Alakh Alok Srivastava in the Supreme Court, seeking the maximum sentence of a death penalty to those offenders involved in the rape and brutal murder of children between the age group of 0 to 12.
The cabinet took up two draft ordinances for consideration, one prescribing the death penalty for those convicted of raping children below 12 years and the other empowering the executive to provisionally attach the property of suspected economic offenders who have left the country to escape trial, three senior government officials said on condition of anonymity.
The amendment of the POCSO Act comes in the backdrop of nationwide outrage over the brutal rape incidences in Kathua district of Jammu and Kashmir and rape of a minor girl in Unnao.
On Friday, the government had told the Supreme Court that the process to amend the POCSO Act has been launched. It further said that the special legislation would include death penalty as punishment for raping children under 12.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Apr 21, 2018 02:35 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).