Lead Specialist, Gender Justice, Oxfam India, New Delhi, India and Research Scholar, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India.
Dean and Professor, School of Media and Cultural Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India.
Sex Reprod Health Matters. 2021;29(2):1878656. doi: 10.1080/26410397.2021.1878656.
India enacted a new child sexual abuse law in 2012 and made important changes to the rape law in 2013 to expand the definition of rape and sexual assault, introduce several reforms and improve gender sensitivity in rape trials. However, the child sexual abuse law with its definition of who is a child has increased the age of consent for sex from 16 years to 18 years, echoed by similar changes in the rape law. This paper revisits the debates on the age of consent in India in the late nineteenth century. It reviews them in the light of the new legislative changes, adjudication of cases of sexual assault, and examines the implications of the new laws on adolescents and their sexuality. We contend that the changes in the law have resulted in several challenges: for adolescents exploring their sexuality on the one hand, and for courts to adjudicate on love, romance, and elopement, on the other. Further, in conjunction with raising the age of consent, other changes such as mandatory reporting of sexual activity among adolescents, especially by hospitals, have increased family control on adolescents' sexuality and strengthened regressive social norms linked to marriages. One of the most troubling developments is the resulting barriers to adolescents' access to reproductive and sexual health care. This paper explores how laws devised to address harm and extend protection to children play into dominant social norms and are in the service of protectionist and patriarchal control on young people and their sexuality.
印度于 2012 年颁布了一项新的儿童性虐待法，并于 2013 年对强奸法进行了重要修改，扩大了强奸和性侵犯的定义，引入了几项改革措施，并提高了强奸审判中的性别敏感性。然而，儿童性虐待法对谁是儿童的定义将性行为的同意年龄从 16 岁提高到 18 岁，强奸法也做了类似的修改。本文重新审视了 19 世纪末印度关于同意年龄的争论。它结合新的立法变化、性侵犯案件的判决，审查了新法对青少年及其性行为的影响。我们认为，法律的修改带来了一些挑战：一方面是青少年探索性行为，另一方面是法院对爱情、浪漫和私奔进行判决。此外，随着同意年龄的提高，青少年性活动的强制性报告等其他变化，尤其是医院的报告，增加了家庭对青少年性行为的控制，加强了与婚姻相关的倒退社会规范。最令人担忧的发展之一是青少年获得生殖和性健康护理的障碍。本文探讨了旨在解决伤害和扩大对儿童保护的法律如何与主流社会规范相契合，并为保护主义和父权制对年轻人及其性行为的控制服务。
