JJ Act | MP High Court Pulls Up Child Welfare Committee For Wrongly Rescuing School-Going Children From Hostel

Madhya Pradesh High Court has come down heavily on Child Welfare Committee, Alirajpur and other authorities for acting in excess of their powers while wrongly rescuing a group of school children from a hostel by resorting to Sections 41 and 42 of the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015 (JJ Act).

The single-judge bench of Justice Subodh Abhyankar noted that these children were neither ‘children in conflict with law’ nor ‘children in need of care and protection’ as mentioned in Section 2(13) and (14) of the JJ Act. Moreover, children as well as the hostel that the children were allegedly rescued from are not covered by Sections 41 and 42 of the JJ Act, the court clarified.

“A perusal of the aforesaid provisions clearly reveals that they are meant for the children and institutions prescribed under Sections 41 & 42 of the Act, and thus, are in respect of the children who are either in conflict with law or the children who are in need of care and protection. Similarly, the provisions of Section 2 (13) and (14) are also not applicable in the present case as none of the ingredients of both the sub-sections are present in the impugned order Annexure P/1”, the bench sitting at Indore noted.

Though the respondent state and child welfare committee relied upon a social investigation report prepared under Section 36(2) of the JJ Act, the court opined that nothing in the said report denoted that the children were mistreated in the hostel, which might have allowed the authorities to invoke Sections 41 and 42 of the JJ Act. While allowing the petition filed by the parents of 16 children who were wrongly being kept in childcare, the court observed that the children were ‘unnecessarily harassed’ by the Child Welfare Committee and the childcare centres and they ‘acted in excess of powers’ conferred upon them by the provisions of JJ Act. The court has also instructed the respondent authorities to be cautious in the future to avoid any personal liability due to their lapses.

Before the High Court, the petitioners had also submitted that most of the children in the custody of the childcare institutions received show cause notice from their respective schools for their prolonged absence. Therefore, the single judge bench has instructed the District Magistrate, Alirajpur to ensure that no coercive action is taken against children so that they aren’t left to bear the brunt of the illegal action by the state authorities.

The petitioners had earlier alleged that the children were taken away from the hostel by Child Welfare Committee, Alirajpur on the false pretext that the hostel was being run in contravention of Sections 41 and 42 of the JJ Act. The petition was filed against the retaining of the children so rescued in childcare institutions. During the proceedings, the two childcare institutions where the children were kept did not file their objections or appear through a counsel in the court.

While disposing the writ petition, the court has also directed the state authorities to release the children to their parents within one week, after due verification.

Case Title: Digvijay Singh & Ors v. State of Madhya Pradesh, Department of Women & Children & Ors

Case No: Writ Petition No. 23718 of 2023

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