CHILD RIGHTS IN THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM: NEED FOR LAW REFORM to protect the children in the country. We cannot hold the child responsible for a crime before first providing him/her the basic rights given to him by the Indian Constitution.”44 There are several other crucial developmental aspects of adolescence that are associated with changes in physical, cognitive, and psycho-social characteristics, as well as with attitudes toward intimacy and independence.45 A paper written by Laurence Steinberg concluded that the age of criminal responsibility for juveniles should not be reduced to 16. There is scientific evidence that the part of the frontal lobe that helps a person understand consequences of actions only starts developing in late adolescence and matures by 24-25 years. Thus, risky behaviour is common among adolescents. According to him ‘adolescent brain is malleable, adolescence is a period of both tremendous opportunity and risk’.46 The essence of the Juvenile Justice Act is to reform. Harsh punishment cannot be a deterrent and this, in turn, could make the juveniles hard core criminals. We have come far from the age of Oliver Twist and Charles Dickens and based on understandings of child rights and child psychology, we know that children in conflict with law can be reformed and restored in mainstream society. We—the family, community, school, society, the State — have failed in preventing the child in need of care and protection from turning into a child in conflict with law. There is a hue and cry over the release of a juvenile offender. We have followed the rule of law even while dealing with terrorists, so why should constitutional norms and international human rights standards be violated in these cases? Certainly, justice has to be done to the victim and rule of law has to be followed but because we have failed, we must take responsibility.47 The JJ Act, 2015, must be amended in the best interest of the child. The age of criminal responsibility must be increased to 18 years and children should be protected from the harshness of the criminal justice system and prevented from turning into hard core criminals. 44 45 46 47 Justice J.S. Verma Committee, Report of the Committee on Amendments to Criminal Law, Government of India, 2013, Available at: http://csrindia.org/images/download/Amendments-To-Criminal-Law.pdf. Accessed on Sept. 20, 2022. Mariam Arain, Maliha Haque, Lina Johal, Puja Mathur, Wynand Nel, Afsha Rais, Ranbir Sandhu, and Sushil Sharma, Maturation of the adolescent brain, Neuropsychiatr Dis Treat. 2013; 9: 449–461. Published online 2013 Apr 3. doi: 10.2147/NDT.S39776. Available at: https://www. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3621648/. Accessed on Sept 20, 2022 Laurence Steinberg, Age of Opportunity: Lessons from the New Science of Adolescence, New York; Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company; 2014. Available at https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/adolescent-brain. Accessed on Sept. 20, 2022. Bajpai, Asha, “We as a society have failed,” The Hindu, Mumbai, 28.11.2015, Available at: https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/mumbai/ asha-bajpai-on-juvenile-crimes/article7924266.ece. Accessed on Sept. 1, 2022. UPDATED: NOVEMBER 28, 2015 02:15 IS 59