A 7-year-old boy from Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh allegedly raped a 5-and-a-half-year-old girl. The accused boy was produced before the Juvenile Justice (JJ) Board on Tuesday.

The accused boy has been booked under section 376 (rape) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. 

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But, should a 7-year-old child be tried and punished under POCSO Act? A day after the crime, India Times speak to a group of people to learn what they think about it.

34-year-old lawyer and father to a 10-year-old son, Rishabh Goenka said, “It is shocking beyond belief. The boy needs psychological help. As kids, they do what they see around them. Now, the thing is, he might have seen a movie or a song depicting sexual intimacy. It is also possible that he saw something other than this which he shouldn’t have, knowingly or unknowingly.”

Making it clear that the boy must be tried under POCSO, he added, “At the end of the day, a crime is a crime. Kids learn from the society and do what their minds deem as acceptable to elders. So, an action should have a reaction if we want to live in a society that is responsible.” 

Nandita, a 30-year-old media professional who has a 3-year-old niece said, “If the boy gets away with it now, he will think he can get away with it in future as well. So, this should be stopped.”

“Compare it with other times our children do something wrong. If they pick up a habit of shoplifting or bullying others, as parents we tend to counsel them and at times, punish them too. They boy should be punished for what he did.”

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Abhay (name changed), a 26-year-old documentary filmmaker said, “The young age of the boy makes one wonder what could have made him do such an act and warrants serious psychological examination.”

Abhay said, “In similar cases in the US, the juvenile perpetrators were found to be victims of abuse themselves, which led to their unnatural behaviour.”

“For a young boy who hasn’t even reached the age of puberty to be aware of sexual acts, he committed such a heinous crime. It is making me think what was going on in the boy’s mind. We must seriously investigate the story to understand what led to the boy committing this act,” he said.

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Differing with the popular opinion, a 38-year-old housemaker and mother to two young girls Sarita Wadhwa said, “Most of the time children are not aware of their actions. They are not mature enough to understand what they are doing. Sending a boy of that age to a juvenile home would mean abandoning him from the society. And the condition of juvenile homes in our country is very well known.

He would grow up to think what did he do to deserve that. There is a huge risk of him growing up to be a criminal. I believe he should be properly counselled, educated about right and wrong and not left to rot in a remand house.”

It is important to note while the boy has been booked under IPC and POCSO Act, he is entitled to partial immunity under section 83 of the IPC. The said section reads, “Nothing is an offence which is done by a child above seven years of age and under twelve, who has not attained sufficient maturity of understanding to judge of the nature and consequences of his conduct on that occasion.”