Consent

Doctors, psychologists and activists oppose lowering age of consent to 16

Several doctors, psychologists, rights activists and lawyers on Thursday opposed attempts seeking lowering of legal age of consent from 18 to 16 years, with NHRC member Priyank Kanoongo terming the move a "time bomb", which, if "not defused", will "explode inside families". At a roundtable held here on the sensitive subject, many doctors argued that at 16, a human brain is "not mature enough" to take decisions related to healthy sexual relationship or weather its psychological impact, and for such girls it also carries the risk of teenage pregnancies and "concomitant health hazards". The Supreme Court has been urged by amicus curiae and senior advocate Indira Jaising to read down the statutory age of consent from 18 to 16 years. Jaising, who is assisting the top court in the 'Nipun Saxena vs Union of India' case, recently filed her written submissions challenging the blanket criminalisation of sexual activity involving adolescents aged 16 to 18 under the Protection of Children from

'Bring down age of consent from 18 to 16 years': Plea filed in SC

The Supreme Court has been urged by amicus curiae and senior advocate Indira Jaising to read down the statutory age of consent from 18 to 16 years. Jaising, who is assisting the top court in "Nipun Saxena v. Union of India" case, has filled her written submissions challenging the blanket criminalisation of sexual activity involving adolescents aged 16 to 18 under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO), 2012 and Section 375 of IPC. She has argued the current law criminalises consensual romantic relationships among adolescents and violates their constitutional rights. Jaising said the legal framework wrongly equates consensual relationships between adolescents with abuse, ignoring their autonomy, maturity, and capacity to consent. There is no rational reason or empirical data to justify the increase in the age of consent from 16 to 18 years, Jaising submitted, noting that the age had remained at 16 for over 70 years until it was raised by the Criminal Law ...

Consent, data, parental nod on social media in focus: Experts on DPDP

The draft DPDP rules which moot parents' verifiable consent to create a child's user account on social media platforms, and adds localisation requirement for certain types of personal data has significant ramifications for big tech firms, experts say noting that businesses may also face "complex challenges" in managing consent which is core to data protection norms. According to Deloitte India, maintaining consent artefacts and offering the option to withdraw consent for specific purposes would necessitate changes at design and architecture level of applications and platforms. The comment comes against the backdrop of government releasing the long-awaited draft of Digital Personal Data Protection Rules which proposes to make parent's verifiable consent and identification mandatory for creation of child's user account on online or social media platforms, and also moots possible data localisation requirements for specified personal data. The provision related to localisation and ...

Supreme Court flags 'worrying trend': When love turns sour, FIRs follow

The Supreme Court highlighted a 'worrying trend' of criminalising long-term consensual relationships when they turn sour, calling for careful scrutiny to prevent misuse of criminal laws

Bombay HC upholds rape conviction, says consent cannot apply to minor wives

The Bombay High Court upheld a 10-year prison sentence for a man found guilty of raping his minor wife, stating that consensual sex with a minor is legally considered rape, even in marriage

Paytm seeks Sebi settlement over potential ESOP issuance norms violation

Regulator had slapped show-cause notice for potential violation of allotment norms

Account aggregator ecosystem clocks 100 million consents on framework

With 1059% growth, India's AA ecosystem is the fastest growing open finance ecosystem in the world

Eco Survey calls for action for rising mental health issues among Indians

The Economic Survey on Monday flagged a rise in mental health issues among Indians, calling for a paradigm shift towards a bottom-up, whole-of-community approach to address the problem. Paying attention to mental health in society is both a health and an economic imperative, the policy document asserted while dwelling on the topic in a vast and detailed manner for the first time highlighting the various socio-economic repercussions of the issue. Mental health drags down productivity more widely in the ecosystem than individuals' physical health issues, it noted. Quoting the National Mental Health Survey (NMHS) 2015-16 data, the survey said 10.6 per cent of adults suffered from mental disorders in India while the treatment gap for mental disorders ranged between 70 to 92 per cent for different disorders. Further, as per the NMHS, the prevalence of mental morbidity was higher in urban metro regions (13.5 per cent) as compared to rural areas (6.9 per cent) and urban non-metro areas (4

MeitY lets tech firms, data fiduciaries decide on parental consent methods

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has urged tech firms to adopt advanced methods for obtaining parental consent while allowing them to determine the best practices independently

Mark Zuckerberg's Meta faces EU charges for Digital Markets Act breach

After Apple, the European Commission is preparing to charge Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook for its 'pay or consent' model

Law Commission to clear its stand on One nation one election today

Sources privy to the development have informed ANI that 'One Nation One Election' would be beneficial not only in the national interest but would also save a lot of the financial reserves of the govt

Parental consent for love marriages: Gujarat CM says, will look into issue

Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel said that his government will carry out a study on the proposal "if the Constitution does not become a hindrance"

Japan raises age of consent to 16, criminalises voyeurism under new reforms

The reforms however make an exception for teen couples with no more than five years of age gap from prosecution, given that both the partners are above 13 years of age

POCSO enacted not to punish minors in consensual relations, says HC

The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act was enacted not to punish minors in a consensual relationship and to brand them as criminals, the Bombay High Court has said while granting bail to a 23-year-old man who was booked on the charge of raping a minor. A single bench of Justice Anuja Prabhudessai in the order passed on April 26 noted that it was true that the victim in the case was a minor, but her statement prima facie indicates that the relationship was consensual. "It needs to be noted that the POCSO Act has been enacted to protect children from offences of sexual assault, sexual harassment, etc, and contains stringent penal provisions as to safeguard the interest and the well-being of the children," the HC said. "The object is certainly not to punish minors in romantic or consensual relationship and brand them as criminals," it added. The court was hearing a plea filed by one Imran Shaikh, who was booked by the Mumbai police for allegedly kidnapping and ...

No plans to reduce age of consent for consensual relationships: Centre

Government has no plans to reduce the age of consent for consensual relationships, the Rajya Sabha was informed on Wednesday. In a written reply to a question whether the government is considering changing the age of consent for consensual relationships to 16 years from the present 18 years, Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani said the question "does not arise". The minister said the Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act, 2012 enacted to safeguard children from sexual abuse and sexual offences clearly defines a child as any person below the age of 18 years. The Act was further amended in 2019 to introduce more stringent punishment, including death penalty for committing sexual crimes on children, with a view to deter the perpetrators and prevent such crimes against children. "In case of commission of offence by child, Section 34 under POCSO Act already provides procedure in case of commission of offence by child and determination of age by Special ..

Sebi plans to overhaul consent settlement rules, reduce timeline by a third

At present, a settlement application can be filed in 60 days of receipt of show-cause; another 120 days given to noticee paying 25% over settlement amount, which Sebi wants to do away with

Teen angst in the digital age

Book review of Stoned Shamed Depressed: An Explosive Account of the Secret Lives of India's Teens

Bengaluru's first midwife-based birth centre makes a case for choice

A birthing centre in Bengaluru is helping women make informed decisions about their pregnancy, right down to choosing how they have their baby

The question of consent

To be sure, the issue of consent is tricky