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Summary: The following text was submitted in a letter to President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan today by SPARC calling for the establishment of exclusive Juvenile Courts in Punjab province.
As of 15 September 2006, there are 1503 young offenders in Punjab jails. Only 203 are convicted (14%) while the rest, some 1304, are under trials (86%). According to section 10, the youth courts shall, on taking cognizance of an offence, decide the case within four months. But the majority of these young offenders spent much longer periods of time in confinement contrary to section 10 (7) of the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance 2000 (JJSO). The establishment of exclusive juvenile courts is the only solution to this disturbing state of affairs. The need for exclusive juvenile courts emerges more urgently in Punjab when we look at the overall situation of the prisoners in Punjab. There is a total of 60,222 prisoners in Punjab. Over 67 per cent of the total are under trial whereas the same percentage of young people is 86 per cent. While 33 per cent of the total Punjab prison population is convicted or condemned, the percentage for young people is 14 per cent. The high percentage of under trial juveniles as shown above augments the need for setting up exclusive juvenile courts in Punjab. Detaining a young person in prison for more time than necessary is an affront to human dignity. Human beings must not be allowed to perish in jail like a vegetable or to die in an iron cage like an animal through no fault of their own. There can be a dramatic decrease in the number of under trial prisoners if exclusive Juvenile Courts are set up as promised under section 4 of the JJSO. Section 4 of the JJSO states, “(1) The provincial government shall in consultation with the Chief Justice of High Courts, by notification in the official Gazette, establish one or more Juvenile Courts for any local area within its jurisdiction. (2) The High Court may (a) confer powers of Juvenile Court on---i) Court of Sessions; or ii) Judicial Magistrate or the First Class; and (b) appoint, from amongst practicing Advocates having at least seven years standing at the Bar, Presiding Officers of Juvenile Courts with powers of a Judicial Magistrate of the First Class for the purposes of this Ordinance on such terms and conditions as the High Court may determine.” Though the Lahore High Court has conferred the powers of the Youth Courts upon all the Senior Civil Judges-cum-Judicial Magistrates Section 30 in the Punjab for the trial of offences not exclusively triable by a Court of Session, under the JJSO, within their respective jurisdiction vide latter No. 4961/JOB (1)/VI.F-6, dated April 3, 2001, yet these courts are not following the procedure laid down in the section 6 of the JJSO. Subsection 2 of the Section 6 of the JJSO says, “A Juvenile Court shall not ordinarily take up any other case on a day when the case of a child accused is fixed for evidence on such day.” The subsection 3 further puts bar on the presence of any individual in the court room except the members of the Juvenile Court, parties to the case, the guardian of the child and such other person as the Juvenile Court directs to be present. During the proceedings of the 62 cases here in Lahore and the several interviews that I conducted inside the different jails in Punjab being the non-official visitor, not even a single magistrate have taken into consideration the subsection 2 and 3 of the section 6 or section 7 or section 10 of the JJSO 2000. However, if we have exclusive youth courts, the judges will have time for proper hearing of the cases of young people. They will have the complete understanding of the JJSO as well. Many of the magistrates are not aware of the JJSO and the role of the Probation Officer under the section 9 of the said ordinance. The lack of awareness about the JJSO was stated clearly a reason of r the delayed trails in a judgment by the Honorable Judge of the Lahore High Court (2006 Pakistan Criminal Law Journal 430). In the above-mentioned 62 cases, no magistrate has ever asked any probation officer to, “Assist the Juvenile Court by making a report on the child’s character, educational, social and moral background (Sec. 9 of JJSO).” The exceptionally low conviction rate for children coupled with the delays in their adjudication and the severely limited recreational and educational opportunities in Punjab prisons, means that most spend months or even years in needless and damaging confinement. However, by designating courts exclusively for young people, the government can minimise the prospects of custodial abuse and prolonged detention of hence giving them an opportunity to return to normal life.