Section 21 of the POCSO Act punishes failure to report, not pressure on others to stay silent: Bombay High Court

28 October 2026

The Bombay High Court has held that persuading the parents of a child not to report a sexual offence is not by itself punishable under Section 21 of the POCSO Act, which is the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. Justice Hiten Venegavkar, sitting singly, discharged a man who had been booked on that charge. The judge read Section 21 as penalising only the failure of a person who is himself under the statutory duty to report such an offence. The Court drew a line between that failure and a claim that someone stopped another person from lodging a complaint. Threatening, intimidating or pressuring a parent may well be an offence under some other penal provision, the judge said, and may be evidence of deliberate non-reporting where the duty applied. But it cannot stand in place of the essential ingredients of the offence of non-reporting. The Court said it must first ask whether the person had the required knowledge and whether there was material to proceed. The ruling narrows the reach of the reporting offence under the Act.