The Prime Minister’s Office has asked the Maneka Gandhi-led Women and Child Development ministry to examine a proposal seeking chemical castration as an additional punishment for child rapists, ThePrint has reported.

According to reports, the decision was taken after the Supreme Court Women Lawyers Association (SCWLA) has made a representation to the PMO.

“Reply may be sent to the petitioner and a copy of the same may be uploaded on the portal,” the PMO’s 26 April communication to the ministry reads.

“Apart from the death penalty, a specific legislation providing for additional punishments like chemical castration of the offenders in the rarest of rare cases is the need of hour in such cases,” the SCWLA had said in its letter.

Following outrage over the alleged rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua, the government had introduced the death penalty for child rapists through an ordinance.

“Though courts can pronounce death penalty on those convicted of raping girls below the age of 12, an additional punishment of chemical castration will act as a deterrent,” SCWLA president Mahalakshmi Pavani has said.

“By removing the libido, you are targeting the ego of a man,” she added.

According to The Sun, “Chemical castration is the use of ‘anaphrodisiac’ drugs to lower sexual desire and libido, with treatment lasting three to five years”.

The United States, South Korea, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, Poland and Russia have provisions for chemical castration to punish offenders.