Should the age of consent be lowered?
HEn In the decision of the Supreme Court (YK) on January 10 State of Uttar Pradesh vs. Anurudh and Anr.He acknowledged that the Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses Act 2012 (POCSO) is being increasingly misused in consensual, romantic teenage relationships where one of the parties is a minor. He urged the Union government to initiate corrective measures to exempt genuine adolescent relationships from the strict implementation of special child protection law. This reignited the ‘age of consent’ debate.
Legal framework
Age of consent refers to the legally defined age at which an individual can consent to sexual activity. In India, under the gender-neutral POCSO Act, this period is currently 18 years. Anyone under this age is classified as a “child,” making it legally invalid for them to consent to sexual acts. As a result, sexual acts with minors are considered “statutory rape” based on the legal presumption that minors lack the capacity to give valid consent. Section 19 of the POCSO Act mandates that any person who suspects or has knowledge of an offense under the Act, is likely to occur or has already been committed must report it to the local police or the Special Juvenile Police Unit.
The 18-year threshold was firmly entrenched within the broader criminal law framework by the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2013. This Act significantly amended Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which, among others, defined ‘rape’ and set the ‘age of consent’ at 16 years by 2012. The amendments, aimed at strengthening laws on sexual offenses against women, brought comprehensive protection against sexual exploitation of children by aligning Section 375 of the IPC with the age limit of 18 years prescribed in the POCSO. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, maintained this view: Section 63 defines rape to include sexual acts with or without consent if the woman is under 18 years of age.
Historically, India’s age of consent has varied significantly; It increased from 10 years under the 1860 IPC to 12 (Age of Consent Act, 1891), then to 14 and then to 16 until POCSO increased the age to 18 in 2012. Importantly, the age of consent is different from the “minimum age of marriage”, which is 18 for women under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006. For men it is 21.
Arguments in favor
Debate over the age of consent has intensified in recent years due to an increase in POCSO cases, particularly involving adolescents aged 16-18, with girls often testifying about ‘consensual sex’. Those who advocate lowering the age of consent argue that the current law does not recognize adolescent sexuality and violates the autonomy of young people aged 16-18 who can give mature consent. They underline the purpose of the POCSO Act, emphasizing that it is designed to prevent child sexual abuse and not to criminalize consensual romantic relationships between older adolescents.
Reflecting the ground realities of ‘adolescent sexual behaviour’, NFHS-4 (2015-16) shows that 11% of girls had their first sexual experience before the age of 15 and 39% before the age of 18. An Enfold study analyzing 7,064 POCSO verdicts (2016-2020) across Assam, Maharashtra and West Bengal found that 24.3% of them involved romantic relationships, while 82% involved romantic relationships. In such cases, victims refuse to testify against the defendant. Another Enfold-Project 39A study covering 264 cases under Chapter 6 of POCSO (aggravated penetrative sexual assault) in the same states found that 25.4% of them involved consensual relationships. Many therefore advocate a more nuanced legal approach that respects the consent of people over the age of 16 while also protecting against coercion, exploitation or abuse of power. Instead of sweeping criminalization, which often leads to abuse, they call for shifting the conversation to informed, open dialogue around sex education, relationships, and consent. In many Western democracies, the age of consent is 16 and there are safeguards against coercion and abuse. Countries such as the UK, Canada and some EU countries recognize ‘close age’ exemptions or the ‘Romeo-Juliet clause’, ensuring that young people who engage in consensual relationships with slightly older peers are not criminalised.
challenge
However, there are serious concerns about lowering the age of consent. Many believe such a move would risk weakening the deterrent framework, enabling human trafficking and other forms of child exploitation under the guise of consent. The current “bright line rule,” which recognizes that all individuals under the age of 18 are incapable of consenting to sexual activity, reflects a clear legislative intent to create a clear zone of protection for minors under the POCSO Act and BNS. This rule prevents subjective judgments by replacing them with an objective and consistent standard. Individuals opposed to lowering the age of consent acknowledge that courts can exercise “directed judicial discretion” in individual cases of consensual teenage relationships, but they warn against codifying such exceptions in law.
Even more worrying, child abuse often occurs by people in positions of trust, such as family members, neighbors, teachers and caregivers; A 2007 study by the Ministry of Women and Child Development found that more than 50% of abusers were known to the child. In such cases, children often lack emotional independence or the capacity to resist or report abuse; This makes any claim of consent meaningless. Watering down the law would legitimize repression, lead to suppression of disclosures, and contravene constitutional and legal commitments to protect the interests of children. Lowering the age would also run the risk of young children being encouraged to engage in sexual activity prematurely before they have the emotional maturity to understand the consequences.
Parliament has consistently rejected proposals to lower the age of consent. The Justice Verma Committee had recommended keeping this number at 16 under IPC Section 375, but Parliament chose to increase this number to 18 in 2013 in line with the POCSO framework. The 240th Report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Human Resource Development (2011) rejected the recognition of minor consent in the POCSO Bill, stating that willingness or maturity is legally irrelevant. Similarly, the 167th Report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs (2012) supported raising the age limit to 18 and opposed the ‘near age’ exemption. Finally, the Law Commission’s 283rd Report on the age of consent (2023) warned that lowering the age of consent would turn POCSO into a “paper law” and undermine efforts to combat child marriage, prostitution and human trafficking.
Legal opinions
While courts have repeatedly faced the difficult task of following the letter of the law, they have also recognized that in some cases, applying the law can cause real harm to those they seek to protect. Inside State against Hitesh (2025), the Delhi High Court (HC) stated: “…societal and legal views on teenage love should emphasize the rights of young individuals to enter into romantic relationships free from exploitation and abuse…. The law should evolve to accept and respect these relationships as long as they are consensual and free from coercion.” Similarly Bombay HC Ashik Ramjaii Ansari vs State of Maharashtra (2023) argued that sexual autonomy includes both the ‘right to engage’ in consensual activities and the ‘right to be protected’ against sexual aggression, and that recognizing both is key to respecting human sexual dignity.
However, Mohd. Rafayat Ali vs Delhi StateThe Delhi HC argued that if the victim is below 18 years of age, “consent is legally irrelevant” under POCSO. Most importantly, on August 20, 2024, the Supreme Court overturned the controversial Kolkata HC verdict that had acquitted a man in a POCSO case involving a 14-year-old girl and reaffirmed that POCSO does not recognize “consensual sexual intercourse” with minors. However, later, invoking Article 142 (extraordinary jurisdiction), the high court refused to impose a sentence despite the conviction, stating that the girl did not consider the incident as a crime and that she suffered more damage from the legal process rather than the act, but also stated that the decision should not be considered as a precedent.
More recently, during the hearing of a case in the SC on August 19, 2025, Justice BV Nagarathna observed that romantic relationships between persons on the verge of the age of majority should be viewed differently. “Look at the trauma a girl goes through when she loves a boy and he is sent to jail because her parents file a POCSO case to cover up the escape,” Justice Nagarathna said.
The road ahead
While lowering the age of consent is within the purview of Parliament, the SC must step in to clarify the growing interpretive divide between the legal framework and HC decisions and ensure consistency for both investigative agencies and lower courts. Moreover, laws alone cannot address the layered and complex realities of adolescent life. For real impact, we need a holistic approach that includes access to comprehensive sex education, respect for young people’s autonomy, accessible sexual and reproductive health services, gender-sensitive and responsive law enforcement, and, above all, a social ecosystem that supports adolescents, especially girls, when they experience conflict with their families.
Data from studies like Enfold paint a clear picture; There are too many cases arising from consensual love, often weaponized by disapproving parents, clogging up the courts and eroding trust in the system without addressing underlying issues like poor sex education or cultural taboos around dating. The challenge involves not only analyzing whether the age of consent will remain 18 or drop to 16, but also how the law can be reformed to distinguish genuine teenage relationships from exploitative relationships. A blanket reduction risks weakening child protection; but the current general rule unfairly criminalizes consensual intimacy by young people.
Rather than a blanket reduction that could open the floodgates to predators disguising coercion as consent, we need a pragmatic tweak: introduce ‘near-of-age’ exemptions for 16-18 year olds, say within a 3-4 year window, while strengthening school programs on healthy relationships, consent and emotional resilience, while introducing mandatory forensic reviews to uncover any malicious acts. In this way, we honor adolescents’ autonomy without weakening protections and create a framework in which children learn to navigate love safely, reducing the abuse of laws and promoting a more empathetic society.
Kartikey Singh is a lawyer based in New Delhi.
