US: 25,000 Child porn cases in 5 months in India; Rajya Sabha panel report on child porn

On January 28, 2020, a non-profit organization in the US called the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) said that over 25,000 cases of child pornography have been uploaded in 5 months in India. The data has been shared by the organization with the National Crime Records Bureau.

Highlights

The Home Ministry has signed an agreement with the NCMEC in 2019 to obtain data on Child pornography being uploaded in India. According to Ministry of Home Affairs, Delhi tops the list when it comes to Child sexual Abuse material followed by Maharashtra, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

POCSO Act

In June 2019, the Indian Government widened the definition of Child pornography under POCSO (Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences) act. It now covers visual depiction, video, photograph, digital or computer-generated image that appears to depict a child.

Rajya Sabha Panel

An Ad-hoc committee was constituted by the Chairman of Rajya Sabha Shri M Venkaiah Naidu. The committee has submitted its report on January 26, 2020. The committee has made 40 recommendations to prevent sexual abuse of children.

• The report calls to remove such content also enable parents for early detection of access to such content by children.
• The committee has also recommended to amend POCSO act and IT act, 2000.

Month: Current Affairs - January, 2020