History of Legislation on Children in Conflict with Law

Abstract

Nations introduced separate legislation for juvenile offenders and children requiring care and protection. With the enactment of the Juvenile Justice Act (JJA) 1986, though there continued to be a single law, two distinct types of machinery were set up to deal with "neglected juveniles” and "delinquent juveniles”. Both these categories of children were kept in the Observation Home while their inquiries were pending before their respective competent authorities. Juvenile Justice Act (JJA) 2000 for the first time provided for "juveniles in conflict with law" and "children in need of care and protection" to be kept separately pending their inquiries. In the 2015 legislation also this approach continued. This segregation aims to reduce the corruption of the innocent child from the influence of the “criminal juvenile".