What to Read in Indian Express Editorial( Topic and Syllabus wise)

EDITORIAL 1: Judicial discretion and bail in POCSO cases

Context

Earlier this month, a special POCSO court in Mumbai granted bail to a 40-year-old female teacher accused of sexually assaulting a teenage boy, noting the consensual nature of their relationship.

POCSO

• The order comes amid ongoing debates about bail jurisprudence under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, a stringent legal provision which specifically deals with sexual offences against minors (those under the age of 18).
• POCSO Act came into effect on 14th November 2012 which was enacted in consequence to India’s ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1992.
• The aim of this special law is to address offences of sexual exploitation and sexual abuse of children, which were either not specifically defined or in adequately penalised.
• Note that the law departs from the standard criminal law principle of “presumption of innocence” — instead of the prosecution having to prove the guilt of an accused, as is the norm, the accused bears the burden of proving his innocence.

Bail in POCSO cases

• Over the years, getting bail in POCSO cases, especially in early stages of an investigation, has been challenging.
• POCSO offences are cognizable and non-bailable:arrests can be made without a warrant, and bail is not automatic. But the law does not contain specific statutory guidelines on bail.
• Under Section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023factors under consideration for bail include the nature and gravity of the offence, severity of the punishment, risk of flight, and likelihood of tampering with evidence or influencing witnesses.
• Over the years, courts have carved additional thresholds for bail in POCSO cases.
• The recent decisions reaffirm that bail under POCSO remains a matter of judicial discretion where courts weigh constitutional liberties against the risk to the victim.

Consent under POCSO

• POSO does not recognise consent below the age of 18. Any sexual act with a teen, even if voluntary, is treated as an offence.
• This creates a legal grey zone in cases where teenagers enter into consensual relationships that later attract criminal charges.
• In recent years, courts have begun considering these nuances while granting bail.
• Bail may be considered favourably if the relationship appears to be consensual, and especially where the victim has recorded a statementbefore the magistrate to that effect.
• Nonetheless, securing bail is often difficult in the early stages of POCSO cases. Courts tend to wait until the victim has recorded her statement and the prosecution has collected key evidence, even if it means prolonged pre-trial custody for the accused.
• In an ongoing case, Senior Advocate Indira Jaising has requested the SC to bring down the age of consent from 18 to 16.
• The criminalisation of adolescent relationships, she argued, is a direct infringement of fundamental rights of the person.
• The Centre’s response stated that such changes, even in the name of reform or adolescent autonomy, would undermine the legal protections designed to safeguard minors and potentially increase the risk of child abuse.

Way forward

• The case highlights growing judicial recognition of consensual teen relationships under POCSO. While the law doesn’t permit consent under 18, courts are balancing protection with adolescent autonomy amid calls for reform.

 

EDITORIAL 2: The Kamchatka quake

Context

An 8.8 magnitude earthquake, one of the strongest on record, struck the Kamchatka Peninsula, in Russia’s far-east, recently triggering a tsunami.

Rare but not unusual

• The earthquake in Kamchatka was the strongest since the 9.1 magnitude quakethat had struck Japan in 2011.
• That quake too had caused a major tsunami which then led to the nuclear disaster at Fukushima.
• Only five earthquakes of magnitude 8.5 and above have occurred in the past 20 years — but it occurred in a region that is one of the most earthquake prone in the world.

Kamchatka Peninsula

• Kamchatka Peninsula lies on the Circum-Pacific seismic belt, more popularly known as the “Ring of Fire”, that witnesses the maximum number of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions on Earth.
• This seismically active belt encircles almost the entire Pacific Ocean —  on its eastern side is the western coast of the Americas, and on its western side lies the Far East and Oceania.
• It touches countries like the United States, Mexico, Chile, Peru, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Japan and Russia.
• According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the Ring of Fire accounts for more than 80% of the planet’s largest earthquakes.
• The nearly 2,000-km long region extending from Kamchatka Peninsula in the north to northern Japan in the south, and including the volcanically-active Kuril Islands of Russia,has witnessed more than 130 earthquake events of 7-plus magnitude since 1900.

Process of subduction

• The Circum-Pacific seismic belt is home to multiple subduction processes,in which the Pacific tectonic plate is clashing against continental land.
• Subduction is a geological process in which one tectonic plate — put simply, a large section of the Earth’s crust — presses against another.
• Usually, the heavier or denser plate, that is, the one with more mass per unit of area, tends to go below the lighter plate.
• But this process results in deformities and creates a huge stress at the plate boundaries. It is this stress that is released in the form of earthquakes.
• The Himalayas were created due to subduction, as a result of the Indian plate pushing against the Eurasian plate. This is also the reason why the Himalayan region is one of the most earthquake-prone in the world.
• The Pacific plate is denser, and is subducting under the continental plate at several places on both sides.
• There is no other place on Earth where so many subduction processes are happening. And this is why the region produces so many earthquakes.

Other active regions

• The Circum-Pacific seismic belt is one of the three large earthquake zones of the Earth. The Alpide belt — spanning from Indonesia through the Himalayas and further to Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey — which runs mostly over the land, is the second-most earthquake-prone zone in the world.
• But unlike the Ring of Fire, which accounts for around 80% of all big earthquakes, the Alpide belt contributes only 15-17%, according to USGS.
• However, this belt traverses some of the most heavily populated areas on the planet, which makes earthquakes in the region extremely deadly.
• In general, while the strongest earthquakes often take place under the ocean, the ones on land, even if they are weaker, are often more deadly due to their proximity to population centres.
• The Kamchatka quake stuck off the coast of the peninsula, which is sparsely populated.
• The third most prominent seismic belt is what is known as the mid-Atlantic ridge, which runs north-south through the middle of the entire Atlantic Ocean, from the Arctic to the Antarctic region.
• The strength of an earthquake is, in part, dependent on the length of the faultline, that is, the extent of the plate boundaries that clash against each other. A larger faultline is more likely to produce a stronger earthquake.

Conclusion

To produce anything stronger, say an event of magnitude 10 or more, a faultline extending to almost the entire Earth would be required. No current faultline is capable of producing a quake that strong.