Bombay Prevention of Begging Act, 1959

At almost every signal in Mumbai, from Dadar to Mulund, a child taps on the car window. Some of those children beg because their families are poor. Others are made to beg by adults who keep the money. The Bombay Prevention of Begging Act, 1959 treats begging as something the State can prevent, and it can detain a person found begging in a special institution. Is that a just way to treat poverty, and what should happen when the person begging is a child? This topic asks you to learn the Act and to judge it.

In two minutes

The Bombay Prevention of Begging Act, 1959 is a State law that treats begging as an offence to be prevented, allows police to take persons found begging before a magistrate and provides for their detention and training in certified institutions; its criminal approach is now widely questioned, and for children the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015 and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 supply a protective framework.

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