‘.instead of 2 mins of pleasure’: Court suggests girls to control their sexual urges

An adolescent girl must control their sexual urges instead of giving in to two minutes of pleasure, the Calcutta high court made an observation while hearing an appeal by a 20-year-old who was convicted in a rape case under the Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.

The court further remarked that adolescent boys must respect young girls and women, their dignity as well as their bodily autonomy.

The bench of justices Chitta Ranjan Dash and Partha Sarathi Sen also voiced concerns over the POCSO Act conflating consensual acts among adolescents with sexual abuse. The court also called for a comprehensive sex education to ensure adolescents avoid legal complications originating from sexual relation at a young age.

“Sex in adolescents is normal but sexual urge or arousal of such urge is dependent on some action by the individual, maybe a man or woman. Therefore, sexual urge is not at all normal and normative. If we stop some action(s), arousal of sexual urge, as advocated in our discussion supra, ceases to be normal,” the court said as quoted by Bar and Bench.

Here are the lists of duties suggested by the court to adolescents:

For adolescent females:

It is their duty to:

Control sexual urges as in the eyes of society she is the looser when she gives in to enjoy the sexual pleasure of hardly two minutes.
Protect her dignity and her right to integrity of the body.
Protect her self-worth.
Thrive for her overall development and self-transcending gender barriers.
Protect the right to autonomy of her body and privacy.

For adolescent males:

“It is the duty of a male adolescent to respect the aforesaid duties of a young girl or woman and he should train his mind to respect a woman, her self worth, her dignity and privacy, and right to autonomy of her body”.