Survivors may get to report child sex abuse by age of 25

Another section of the CRPC, 473, says a court may take cognisance of an older case if it is in the “interest of justice” or the “delay has been properly explained”.

WCD ministry officials, however, said that despite Section 473 there have been many instances where law enforcement agencies have failed to lodge a complaint when child survivors of sexual abuse tried to lodge complaint after they turned adult.

“It is to ensure that no survivor is turned away from lodging a complaint till he/she is 25-yearold that we are proposing the time limit,” the second official said. The ministry decided to take up the issue of allowing survivors of child sexual abuse to report the crime later in life after an Indianorigin woman living in Canada complained to the WCD minister in January that law enforcement agencies in India had refused to lodge her complaint.

The woman who was sexually abused by a relative 51 years ago, when she was a young girl had come to Chennai to report her complaint.

The change that the WCD ministry wants now, however, would not have helped the woman because of the proposed age limit.

Legal experts said they were against the time limit for filing complaint in such offences.

“Putting a time limit that bars a survivor from lodging complaint after he/she is 25 years old will prove counter-productive. Sometimes, it takes ages for a victim who was abused as a child to come out of the trauma,” said advocate Alakh Alok Srivastava who had filed a PIL in Supreme Court in January demanding death penalty for child rapists.

LEGAL EXPERTS SAID THEY WERE AGAINST THE TIME LIMIT FOR FILING COMPLAINT IN SUCH OFFENCES, AS THIS WILL PROVE COUNTERPRODUCTIVE