RIGHT TO HEALTH AND ITS DEPRIVATION VIS-À-VIS CHILDREN OF INCARCERATED PARENTS

India has ratified the Convention on Rights of Child. The idealistic instrument provides for attainment of highest desirable standards of health for children. Even though the spirit of the Convention has been imbibed in the country’s municipal laws such as Juvenile Justice Act, POCSO amongst others, a category of children seem to be negligently or deliberately, nonetheless wrongfully excluded from the protection guaranteed by such social justice laws. This category of children, are not only socially stigmatized and ostracized, but are nowhere in the priority list of policymakers. Even though the present day legislations and judicial pronouncements have started acknowledging children’s rights in general, no concrete steps have been taken for the upliftment of children of incarcerated parents.The lack of regulatory framework and fragmented policies, with some States coming forward with rudimentary institutional support to these children and others blatantly ignoring their plight, have impacted the overall health of such children. Even though Right to Health has been long established as a constitutional safeguard under Article 21 of the Constitution of India, this marginalized group of children are consistently denied the same.On 30^th September 2011, the international community realized that thereis need for discussion on the issue of rights of children of incarcerated parents and thus, the Committee on Rights of Child dedicated its 58^th session to discussions upon Article 9 of the Convention Rights of Child. Some of the recommendations that arrived at the end of the session talked about alternative sentencing such as non-custodial sentencing, setting up of health and educational facilities for children of incarcerated parents, training of jail personnel, subsidized jail visits for children of incarcerated parents etc.For the policy to head start, it is very important to sensitize people about the issue and the calamitous consequences that children of incarcerated parents face in terms of their physical and mental health. Despite the statutory prohibition placed by Juvenile Justice Act in India, jails across the country incarcerate children routinely.There is complete disdain to the very few statutory norms dealing with this issue and therefore, the need of the hour is to educate the authorities along with the society on the cardinality of such issue.