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Report

Updated: over 1 year ago | PDF

On November 14, 2022, the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act completes a decade of being on the statute books in India. When enacted, the POCSO Act marked the culmination of years of campaigning for a dedicated domestic legislation on child sexual abuse. 10 years is a reasonable time period to analyse how this legislation has been functioning and how far it has achieved its stated objectives. This examination of POCSO is also an opportunity to reflect on what has worked and what needs to be improved in the criminal justice system’s response to child sexual abuse. To this end, the Justice, Access and Lowering Delays in India (JALDI) Initiative at Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy has collaborated with the Data Evidence for Justice Reform (DE JURE) program at the World Bank to study the role of the judiciary in the implementation of the POCSO Act in India.