Should India lower age of consent to 16? Inside the heated debate and global practices

The debate over age of consent in India has once again come under the spotlight, with the law currently pegged at 18 years under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and Section 63 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023. This means that any sexual activity with a person below 18 is automatically criminalised, regardless of purported consent.

Child rights advocates have warned that lowering the age of consent from 18 to 16 (which is prevalent in some countries) could expose minors to greater risk of exploitation. Critics argue that the present law unfairly criminalises consensual adolescent relationships.

The current law in India adopts a bright-line rule to safeguard minors from exploitation, with Constitutional backing in Articles 15(3), 21, and 39(f), as well as India’s commitments under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).

The case in Supreme Court

The ongoing Supreme Court case Nipun Saxena v Union of India (Writ Petition (Civil) No. 565 of 2012) has brought renewed attention to this issue.

During hearings in July 2025, senior advocate Indira Jaising, appearing as amicus curiae, argued for lowering the age of consent to 16. She pointed out that blanket criminalisation of consensual relationships between adolescents aged 16-18 often results in the misuse of law against young couples, particularly in cases of elopement or inter-caste relationships.

She posits that this contradicts the Constitutional rights to privacy, dignity, and autonomy under Article 21. She further argued that when Parliament raised the age from 16 to 18 in 2013, it did so without relying on empirical data, which makes the change arbitrary and disproportionate.

The Central government has opposed this proposal in its written submissions. It emphasised that retaining the threshold at 18 is necessary to ensure strong child protection. The state argued that minors lack the psychological and developmental capacity to give informed consent and remain vulnerable to coercion and socio-economic pressures.

The government also highlighted that a uniform age across different laws, such as the Juvenile Justice Act and the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, ensures consistency. Lowering the age of consent, it warned, could undermine protections against child marriage, trafficking, and sexual exploitation while also contradicting India’s international obligations.

Evolution of Age of Consent in India

The age of consent in India has not been uniform through years. In fact, it has gone through several revisits – each reflecting the changes in social attitudes and child welfare considerations.

When the IPC was first enacted in 1860, the age of consent was set at 10 years. Following the Phulmoni Dasi case in 1891, where an 11-year-old girl died from marital rape, the Age of Consent Act raised it to 12. Later, amendments increased it to 14 in 1925, 16 in 1940, and 18 for marriage under the 1978 amendment to the Child Marriage Restraint Act.

The 2012 POCSO Act and the 2013 Criminal Law Amendment, passed in the aftermath of the Nirbhaya case, cemented 18 as the age of consent for all sexual acts. In 2023, the BNS removed the marital rape exception for minors, further coming at par with international standards in the law.

Court precedents

Supreme Court precedents have consistently reinforced this protective framework. In Independent Thought v Union of India (2017), the Court ruled that sexual intercourse with a wife under 18 amounts to rape, bringing marital relationships under the same standard as POCSO. In Eera v State (2017), the Court upheld strict interpretations of POCSO, emphasising a zero-tolerance approach. Although the Justice Verma Committee in 2013 recommended lowering the age to 16, Parliament decided against it to strengthen safeguards.

More recent cases like Sankar v State (2023) have shown judicial flexibility, with the Court invoking Article 142 to grant relief in non-exploitative adolescent relationships, even as rulings such as Attorney General v Satish (2022) reinforced that consent under 18 has no legal value.

NCRB data shows high acquittals due to hostile witness

NCRB data further sheds light on how these laws are being applied in practice. For juveniles aged 16-18 booked under rape charges (Section 376 IPC), apprehensions fell from 1,235 in 2018 to 971 in 2022. However, conviction rates remained low, averaging between 9-11 percent, such as 110 convictions out of 1,193 cases in 2018. Most acquittals were due to hostile witnesses, which accounted for between 69-79 percent of such cases.

Under POCSO provisions, the number of apprehensions of 16-18 year olds rose sharply, from 844 in 2018 to 1,757 in 2022. Conviction rates in these cases were slightly higher than for rape, averaging 17-20 percent, but acquittals were still high, with 75-85 percent of cases collapsing due to hostile witnesses.
For the 18-22 age group, arrests under rape charges remained steady, averaging 4,700-5,000 annually, with conviction rates between 10-14 percent. Similarly, POCSO arrests in this group rose from 8,740 in 2018 to 13,068 in 2022, with convictions between 12-15 percent.Global comparison

Internationally, India’s age of consent at 18 stands on the higher side. Many countries place it between 14 and 16, with some variations. For instance, in Europe, the age is 14 in Germany, Italy, and Austria; 15 in France and Sweden; and 16 in the UK and Spain.

In the US, it varies by state, ranging from 16 to 18. Several Asian countries also follow lower thresholds: Japan raised it to 16 in 2023 from 13, China retains 14, and the Philippines increased it to 16 in 2022 from 12.

At the extremes, Nigeria’s statutory age is 11, while Bahrain sets it at 21. Unlike many countries, India does not have close-in-age or “Romeo-Juliet” provisions that exempt consensual relationships between peers with small age gaps.