India's police keep charging young kids for crimes

Crime: Police in some parts of India may need retraining.

Embarrassed over their latest faux pas in charging a two-year-old with rioting and pelting the police with stones, the Bihar police are probing how an infant had been charged with such crimes. It is not the first time such incidents are taking place in Bihar. Children as young as two and three have been named as criminals in police records, inviting censure from courts and rights bodies. ....In the recent past, nearly half a dozen minors have been slapped with criminal charges for crimes ranging from molestation, attack on police, theft and looting. Under Indian laws, the police cannot file a criminal case against a child below seven years of age. Last month, seven-year-old Santosh Yadav of Tara village in Begusarai district was wanted in a case of torture for dowry. An arrest warrant is pending against him for the last 11 months for allegedly torturing his elder brother's wife. According to Santosh Yadav's father, Rambabu Yadav, who was also named an accused along with his wife, at the time of filing the police complaint, Santosh was only six and a student of Class 3. All of them were later granted bail by the court. In October last year, police booked a three-month-old baby boy for looting a bus. The infant, Praveen Kumar of Nehalpur village in Muzaffarpur district, was named one of the accused in the bus looting case registered at the Meenapur police station.