Balochistan Police has restored a child protection unit, perhaps the only one of its kind in entire province, the other day inside the City Police Station Quetta to provide a child friendly atmosphere to the children who might have come in conflict with law. Such important matters in the province seem to be hanging on a single person as the unit was established in 2014 but went dysfunctional owing to the transfer of a lady SP to the traffic police. And what might have happened to the children in conflict with law during all these years is obvious. They must have been kept alongside hardened criminals in adult cells and might have been abused given the insecure atmosphere and the notorious thana culture in the country. Unfortunate as it is, children happen to fall among the most vulnerable and most neglected sections of populations in societies like ours.
Pakistan is signatory to the Convention on the Rights of Child (CRC) which prevents children being subjected to torture or any other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. It also prohibits awarding capital punishment and life imprisonment for the children and makes provisions for keeping children separate from the adults in case they come in conflict with law. The children, it says, should have right to prompt access to legal and other appropriate assistance in any such case scenario. To protect the children from any arbitrary treatment Pakistan has also done its own legislation. The erstwhile Juvenile Justice System Ordinance has been adopted as an Act, known as Juvenile Justice System Act.
The implementation of this Act seems to be thin across the spectrum. It sets certain dos and don’ts for handling the cases like Juvenile. These include keeping children separate from adults, separate charges and better bail granting options. It provides for trial that needs to be concluded in four months but like other legislations, again the key question is implementation where Pakistan lags behind and when things come to Balochistan, implementation of such laws is even worse. Moreover, The Juvenile Justice Act proposes Borstal Institutions (child care centres) for the moral, and psychological support of the children who have been detained. As per State of the Children in Pakistan Report, 2015,Balochistan has not yet established a Borstal institute, KP has one in Bannu, Punjab has two and four in Sindh.
Let other matters such as child friendly courts and matters determining the age of a Juvenile and in case a child commits an act of terrorism whether he should be given the preferential treatment under the JJSA or not. Even if we consider the establishment of a child care unit in Quetta’s City Police Station a Borstal institute, its establishmentwithin the Police Station where even adults get stressed psychologically is questionable. Moreover, is it only Quetta where children need such an institute? Why not rest of Balochistan? Whose responsibility is it to care for the children of this province? The Government must give a serious thought to the JJSA and allocate funds for all the concessions which are given to the children in the Act so that the young minds could become useful citizens of society in the future.