Children in Conflict with Law/Love: Adolescent Autonomy and the Paradox of Protection

For many minors currently in state custody, the primary barrier to liberty is a legal framework that fails to differentiate between child sexual exploitation and consensual adolescent relations. In the absence of a statutory exception for consenting minors, the legal treatment of consensual adolescent relationships has largely relied on the exercise of judicial discretion. However, on 9 January 2026, the Supreme Court of India (SCI) took a notable step while presiding over a matter on bail jurisdiction in State of Uttar Pradesh v Anurudh and Anr. The court directed  a copy of the judgment to the Secretary of Law and explicitly urged the government to consider the introduction of a Romeo-Juliet clause to the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) 2012. This amendment would aim to protect genuine adolescent relationships from the rigid stronghold of criminal law.

In the context of this recent development, this article draws on field interviews with adolescent girls placed in Child Care Institutions (CCIs) to examine the efficacy of a Romeo-Juliet clause. It thereby interrogates the protectionist framework within the POCSO Act by analysing its non-recognition of factually consensual and non-exploitative sexual acts.

What is a Romeo-Juliet clause?

Named after the Shakespearean play, this provision exempts consensual adolescent sexual activity between individuals proximate in age from prosecution for statutory rape, irrespective of whether both are adolescents or one is a young adult. To qualify for this exception, the relationship must be free from deceit, coercion, and structural imbalances of power. By introducing a ‘close-in-age’ standard that operates alongside the general age of consent, this clause aligns legal protections with developmental realities of evolving adolescent capacity.

This framework is already in place across several jurisdictions, including Canada and various Australian and American states. For instance, in Canada, where the age of consent is 16, a 14- or 15-year-old can consent to sexual activity provided their partner is less than 5 years older. Similarly, a 12- or 13-year-old can consent if their partner is less than 2 years older. These close-in-age exceptions are contingent upon the absence of a relationship of trust or  authority (such as a teacher or a coach), or dependency (such as a caregiver). Likewise, in Tasmania, where the age of consent is 17, the law allows those aged 15 or above to consent to a partner not more than 5 years older, while those aged 12 or above may consent to a partner within a 3-year age gap, provided there exists no relationship of authority.

In India, legislative discourse has primarily centred on the age of consent, largely neglecting the concept of ‘close-in-age’, which has been left to judicial discretion on a case-by-case basis. In several instances, high courts have observed the need for a more nuanced framework. For example, the Madras High Court acknowledged the need for a special bio-social approach in matters relating to adolescents in 2021, while the Karnataka High Court in 2022  urged law commissions to reconsider the age of consent and the government to redefine a ‘Child’ under Section 2(d) of the POCSO Act. In 2019, the Madras High Court  also advocated for amendments to the Act to recognise consensual sexual acts among individuals above the age of 16 and where the age gap between them is not beyond 5 years—a position that can implicitly be read as a call to introduce a Romeo-Juliet clause.

This growing legal tension was also highlighted by the former Chief Justice of India, DY Chandrachud, in December 2022 during the National Consultation on the POCSO Act’s completion of a decade. He expressed concern over the criminalisation of consensual adolescent relations and urged the government to re-examine the statutory age of consent.

The Gendered Paradox

While current discussions on consensual adolescent heterosexual relationships frequently focus on the male child, who enters the system as a ‘child in conflict with the law’^[1] and the target of the state’s persecution, little attention is paid to the girl, who enters state custody under the categorisation of being ‘in need of care and protection’.^[2] Although both parties are below 18 years of age and qualify as a ‘child’ under Section 2(d) of the POCSO Act, social norms dictate a deeply gendered application. The boy is often placed in an observation home, awaiting inquiry with the possibility of being tried as an adult if he is aged between 16 to 18,^[3] while the girl is institutionalised in a childcare institution if she refuses to live with her family or the family refuses to take her in. Institutionalisation is often justified to be in the best interest of the girl to protect her from early pregnancy, marriage, and abuse.

This gendered application of a gender-neutral law in a post-colonial country like India, as noted by Pitre and Lingam (2022), can be traced back to the enduring colonial concept of women as property who had to be ‘shielded’ and the common law provision under criminal law where the ‘age of consent’ was defined only for girls. The limited recognition thus given to the adolescent girl is often filtered through a lens of sympathetic imagery or a protectionist approach centred on familial stability, particularly in cases involving marriage. While such a portrayal may lead to more lenient judicial tones, it is ultimately insufficient, as it replaces a girl’s sexual autonomy with a narrative of victimhood. The law’s refusal to recognise adolescent consent requires a feminist critique of the protectionist model, highlighting how a system designed to be a shield becomes an instrument of control by overriding an adolescent’s evolving capacity to make their own choices.

The observations in this piece are informed by interviews conducted with 10 adolescent girls placed in CCIs in Bengaluru. Categorised as ‘children in need of care and protection’, they were treated as victims/survivors within a framework that rendered their actual consent inconsequential. Specifically, these 16- and 17-year-olds were interviewed to document their journey through a justice system where their consent carried no legal weight. Labelled as the ‘prosecutrix/victim’, these girls confronted the systemic reality that their own testimony of willingness was statutorily invisible. This systemic erasure creates a striking disparity in the state’s intervention: while their adolescent partners were detained as ‘children in conflict with the law’ on serious charges of kidnapping and rape under the POCSO Act, these girls faced a parallel loss of liberty, institutionalised as ‘children in need of care and protection’.

Testimonies of Erasure

Despite their varied individual backgrounds and social locations, a consistent narrative thread emerged from their stories. In most instances, cases against their partners were filed by their families due to disapproval of their romantic relationships or caste locations. This trend has also been pointed out in an Enfold report, which found that informants in 80.2 per cent of the 1,715 ‘romantic’ cases were the families of the girl. These girls also shared that they had eloped with their partners by choice, often as a desperate move against familial disapproval or to escape a forced marriage.

One interviewee recalled,

My father and brother called me a shame to the family when they came to know that I loved someone. They wanted to quickly marry me off to a stranger. I was locked in the house when I refused. When I eloped with Y on my own will, they put a case of POCSO and kidnapping on him. Both he and I surrendered at the police station fearing that he might get into danger. We both walked into the station hand-in-hand hoping that we would be protected.

Many adolescent girls also recount how their repeated statements that they consented to the sexual acts went unheard by the authorities. Instead, they were subjected to shaming and ridicule for their romantic choices. As one girl recalled:

I told the police madam that I was in love with him. He did not harm me. I love him. She shouted at me asking what was the need for all this, that I should have waited for a few more months and turned 18 to fall in love. She said that I brought shame to my family. But how did I bring shame? That moment in the police station felt like everything – my love, my dignity, my choices, had been stripped away. No one listened to what we were trying to say, that we were in love, we wanted to be together.

Beyond the police station, the girls recount the responses received from the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) when they reiterated their love and consent to any sexual acts, for which the partners were treated differently. One interviewee said:

The madam scolded me. Asked me if this was the age to fall in love. She asked me if I didn’t love my family and that I should have thought about my family before falling in love with a lower caste boy. But I think, What wrong did I do? I am not a victim nor am I a ‘case’. I only loved someone; was that the mistake?

Inside the courtroom, the experiences of adolescent girls are marked by contradictions. Despite statutory mandates requiring a support person^[4]to accompany them, many of them navigate these proceedings in total isolation. A notable shift is often observed here; while biological families frequently withdraw support, it is the families of the adolescent partners who often step in, providing the support that they lack. This absence of the mandated support persons throughout the proceedings remains a procedural vacuum mentioned by many.

The internal conflict for these adolescents is most visible in how they view the court. Many characterise the judge as a protective figure, yet they struggle to reconcile this perceived empathy with the legal outcome. They are left to question why a system that appears to listen refuses to recognise the validity of their romantic agency. The testimony of one adolescent captures this disconnect:

Even while giving my statement to the judge, I expressed that we were in love. That he had done no wrong. She listened to me very keenly. I liked that. But later on I was thinking, why did she have to separate him and me, even after listening to me so keenly?

This narrative of separation persists despite judicial signals for reform. In Satish alias Chand v State of Uttar Pradesh, the Allahabad High Court expressed explicit concern regarding the over-criminalisation of consenting adolescents. The court recommended a nuanced framework for such cases, urging the judiciary to assess the context, weigh the victim’s statement, avoid perverse judgments, and crucially, exercise judicial discretion. However, as anecdotes of the adolescent girls suggest, statutory non-recognition frequently overpowers judicial discretion. The result is a rigid application of the Act that often negates the very agency the court is urged to consider.

Residing in the CCIs, these adolescents, categorised by the state as being ‘in need of care and protection’, frequently view the attainment of adulthood as their only path to agency. Even as they endure a total loss of contact with their partners, who are simultaneously detained as ‘children in conflict with the law’, they await the day they turn 18. Many carry a heavy sense of guilt, internalising the belief that their romantic choices caused their partner’s detention and the legal battle that followed. They await the day they can reunite with their partners and finally move away from the oversight of the state.

The certainty with which these adolescents envision their future is captured in one girl’s account:

Even though I have lost contact with him or his family since the day I entered the Home, I am sure that we love each other. What they did to me and my boyfriend is wrong. He is in jail because I loved him. We are being punished for choosing to have a relationship of our choice. I am 17 and a few months old now. I am counting the months until I turn 18. After that I will go to him and we will be together. So, what exactly was the point of this case, akka?

It is a question that the justice delivery system has yet to meaningfully address.

A Solution, or a Signpost toward Autonomy?

While the judiciary increasingly signals the need for a ‘Romeo-Juliet’ clause, the discourse remains stalled in a cycle of passing the baton between the legislature and the courts. As seen in the state’s response to the amicus curiae in Nipun Saxena v Union of India, the executive continues to defer to judicial discretion. However, the foregoing narratives prove that many adolescents fall through the cracks where discretion fails and statutory recognition is absent. Even though convictions are an exception in romantic cases, comprising just 6.2 per cent of 1,715 judgments analysed by Enfold, we are left with children in conflict with the law who are terrified of romance and survivors who carry the guilt that their consent triggered a traumatic legal battle.

The testimonies shared here serve as a foundation for inquiry. They highlight the specific ways in which the current protectionist binary, where a minor is categorised either as a victim or an offender, fails to capture the reality of adolescent love and autonomy. As child rights researchers have argued, this becomes particularly striking in light of Navtej Singh Johar v Union of India, where the court recognised ‘consensual intimacies’ and interpreted individual autonomy to choose one’s partner as integral under Article 21.

The SCI’s nod towards a ‘Romeo-Juliet’ clause is a welcome signpost, but it cannot be the destination. It also raises a fundamental question: is changing the age of consent, or the introduction of a specific clause, the most effective path? Or is there another reimagination of adolescent autonomy in a society where hierarchies of caste dictate autonomy, leading to selective prosecution?

We cannot ignore the paradox of a state machinery that  puts Romeo on trial and places Juliet in a state institution, all while the Anti-Romeo squads continue to police the streets. We also must be cautious that in the process of fixating on the ‘appropriate’ age gap, whether 2 years or 5, we do not sidestep the harder task of validating adolescent autonomy in factually consensual non-exploitative sexual relationships. A close-in-age exemption must, as feminist scholars argue, account for the socialised, gendered expectations of adolescents, consider the totality of circumstances—of which age is only one factor—and ensure the relationship is devoid of coercion, power, and authority. Such an introduction will not prevent investigation, trial, and other legal complexities, as observed in the report by Enfold.

Finally, a growing risk is also observed in the language used by courts to justify their conclusions on the age of consent and/or the need for introduction of a Romeo-Juliet clause. In several instances, courts have invoked the rhetoric of ‘false filing of cases’ and ‘misuse of the law’. This is dangerous, as it feeds into a pre-existing narrative of scepticism and risks delegitimising genuine complaints. The goal of reform must be the recognition of adolescent autonomy, not the dilution of the vital protections the law was designed to provide.

This piece draws from fieldwork conducted with Amaidhi Devaraj and Dr. Kalpana Purushothaman, the author thanks them for facilitating field access. Thanks also to Darshana Mitra for reviewing the draft and Vandana Likhmania for her editorial inputs.   

^[1] Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2015 (JJA). As per the Act, a child in conflict with the law is one who is alleged or found to have committed an offence and is below 18 years on the date of commission of the alleged offence.

^[2] JJA (n 1). The Act broadly categorises children who do not have a home, reside with a person who is a threat to the child, a guardian who is unfit, is vulnerable into drug trafficking, who has been abused, tortured for the purposes of sexual abuse or illegal act as children in need of care and protection. Refer to Section 2(14) for the complete definition.

^[3] JJA (n 1), s15. Under Section 15 of the Act, a child aged 16–18 years and alleged to have committed a heinous offence will undergo a Preliminary Assessment based on which the Juvenile Justice Board decides whether the child shall continue to be tried as a child or be transferred to the adult court to be tried as an adult.

^[4] A Support Person, as per the POCSO Rules 2020, is a person assigned by the Child Welfare Committee, to render assistance to the child or any person assisting the child through the process of investigation and trial.

Image credit: Supreme Court of India by Subhashish Panigrahi via Wikimedia Commons. The original image is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. The original photo has been edited and adapted for use.