A study on Awareness and attitude of the School Students of Ernakulam District in Kerala Related to Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and Child Sexual Abuse

Abstract Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) is an important concern in India, and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012, strongly supports the protection of children. It can originate from grievous crimes of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and pornography. It is a robust legal framework for addressing issues such as reporting, investigation, trial, judgement, compensation, and rehabilitation mechanisms. Therefore, the Act considers the interests of children at every stage of judicial proceedings. This study investigates the awareness and attitude of school students in Ernakulam district, Kerala, regarding the POCSO Act and CSA. We distributed the questionnaire to the selected schools in the Ernakulam district as the base of the study. We found many gaps, such as awareness, reporting, limited knowledge, and other legal safeguards. We have improved communication and education styles with multimedia and Internet facilities. With its progress, it has brought many threats to society, such as cybercrimes and others (UNODC, 2021). With the use of smart phones and the Internet, child sexual abuse, cyberbullying, and grooming have become over powering among children, as noted by the Ministry of Home Affairs (Ministry of Home Affairs [MHA], 2023). This study brings to each one of us the improvement of awareness programmes on the legal frame work of India.