Living next to Usman must be a nightmare. Especially for a family for whom the ghost of a dead child is more powerful than anything alive will ever be. Their son of seven lost his life in play; he was gone in a heartbeat when a bullet pierced his chest. The story may have ended on this grisly note; it all began in mirth and innocence as the children wanted to mark Shab-i-baraat with a bang.

It was a regular day with the same routine for Usman, 9, who went over to his neighbour seven-year-old Mohsin and his younger brother Abrar for their daily evening round of fun and games. Perhaps the fireworks outside prompted them to make some noise of their own. The two brothers went with Usman to get his father’s licensed pistol to bring in the holy night. In the fervour of these playful moments, the weapon went off, killing Mohsin and injuring Abrar who is luckily now out of danger.

Usman has spent over a week in a remand home and has been booked under Pakistan Penal Code’s Section 302 for intentional murder and Section 324 for attempt to murder. He will stay there for another week unless the court charges him with Qatl-e-khata (section 319) and grants bail. According to human rights lawyer, Zia Awan, Section 83 of the penal code states that a child between 7 and 12 years of age cannot be implicated in a crime or placed in any custody.

“The law clearly stipulates that a child of this age cannot be charged with a criminal offence. If adults have the option of Section 319, then how can a child be in a remand home? He should not have been confined,” says Awan.

Awan asserts that the only person responsible for the accident is Sakhawat, Usman’s father for keeping a loaded weapon in the house. “According to the Juvenile Justice System ordinance, a child cannot be sentenced even if the crime has been proved but Usman’s father can be taken in for abetting the crime or for carelessness,” he says.

Research world over shows that the area of the brain that controls moral understanding and impulse is underdeveloped until a person reaches early twenties. Therefore, most child offenders end up with penalty before they can comprehend their crime. In Usman’s case, regardless of whether he is free before the stipulated date, travesty of justice has been committed. He has experienced the rigours and fears of alienation. Aside from the stigma of custody and its psychological repercussions that can haunt him in later years, the nature of our remand homes is more apathetic than corrective. These exclude extracurricular activities such as sports, pursuit of hobbies and education and also overlook rehabilitative measures such as counselling, visits by psychologists, and focused training.

The picture for the girl child, however, is far bleaker. There is not a single institution in the country to house underage offenders. They are thrown into adult jails where the atmosphere is suited for habitual felons. They are not only exposed to drug dealers, prostitutes, murderers but their age makes them dangerously vulnerable to abuse by inmates and jail officials. “A judgment ordering segregation and forbidding jail authorities from keeping adolescents with adults has been passed but is not included in jail manuals,” reveals Awan.

Usman and many like him will always carry the burden of blood but families such as Mohsin’s can go a long way in forcing lawmakers to put age before reason and compassion before correction. Perhaps it also time for civil society to realise that those who prescribe punishment may be guilty of creating a lost generation, too resentful to find options within the law.

reema.abbasi@dawn.com