Supreme Court issues ruling on children offences, says ‘Downloading, watching abuse child porn to be offence under POCSO’

New Delhi: In a landmark judgment on Monday, the Supreme Court of India ruled that downloading and taking a look at child pornography constitutes a punishable offense under the Protection of Kids from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The ruling strengthens the legal framework against child abuse, setting a precedent that consuming such content, even without sharing or distributing it, is a violation of the law.

The significant judgement involved the bench of  Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and Justice JB Pardiwala who put aside the Madras High Court order that had ruled that merely downloading and taking a look at child pornography was not an offence under POCSO Act.

The judgment authored by Justice J.B. Pardiwala suggested that the Parliament should seriously have self belief substituting the term “child pornography” with “child sexual exploitative and abuse subject material” (CSEAM) and within the intervening time, the Union government may bring an ordinance to amend the POCSO.

As well, the head court asked your entire courts across the u . s . to not use the term “child pornography” in any judicial order or judgment, and as a substitute endorse the term “child sexual exploitative and abuse subject material (CSEAM).”

In its judgment, the Supreme Court said that offence under Section 15 of the POCSO is within the nature and kind of an inchoate offence which penalises the mere storage or possession of any pornographic subject material involving a child when done with a particular intent prescribed thereunder, without requiring any actual transmission, dissemination etc.

Madras High Court Judgement

The Madras High Court in its impugned judgment had quashed the FIR and criminal court cases against a 28-year-old Chennai man, holding that taking a look at child pornography in deepest wouldn't fall within the scope of the POCSO Act.

A Bench of Justice N. Anand Venkatesh reasoned that the accused had merely downloaded the subject material and watched the pornography in deepest and it was neither published nor transmitted to others.

“Since he has not used a child or early life for pornographic purposes, at best, or not it can well be going to most effective be construed as an ethical decay on the a portion of the accused person,” it said.

The Chennai police registered an FIR under Sections Sixty seven B of the Information Technology Act and Section 14(1) of the POCSO Act after it seized the phone of the accused and discovered that he had downloaded and possessed child pornography.

(With inputs from agencies)