The 16-year-old Class XI student of Ryan International School, accused of murdering a junior, will be tried as an adult, the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) in Gurugram said on Wednesday.
This would be the first case to come under the new Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015, that came into effect from Jan 15, 2016, which says that juveniles in the age group of 16-18 involved in heinous crimes can be tried as adults.
The JJB, ruling on an application of the victim’s father, said the juvenile delinquent would be tried as an adult and produced before the sessions court on December 22.
“The verdict of the board that the juvenile will be treated and tried as an adult is historic. The juvenile will now be produced before a sessions court and the judge will then assign the case to the relevant Child Sessions Court for the trial,” said Sushil Tekriwal, lawyer of the victim’s father, after the verdict.
He said the verdict implies the limit of three-year jail term for juveniles would not be applicable to the accused if he is convicted. He would not be treated with any leniency.
Tekriwal, according to media reports, said that he was yet to receive the copy of the order, but the court had broadly based its decision on the findings of the Social Investigation Report and the Psychological Report of the juvenile and the amendments carried out in the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 with effect from January 15, 2016. The two reports had indicated that the juvenile was hyper-aggressive, upset and restless.
Moving the application on November 15, seeking the trial of the juvenile as an adult, the victim’s father argued that the manner in which the throat of the seven-year-old was slit showed that the crime was “chilling”, “horrific” and “serious” in nature.
The accused, a Class 11 student of Ryan International School, Bhondsi, had allegedly slit the throat of 7-year-old Class 2 student Pradhyumn Thakur in the school toilet on September 8.
Transferring the case to the sessions court, the JJB said the offence allegedly committed by the teenager was “heinous” and that the circumstances show the teenager was “mature enough” to understand the consequences of his act and to think of ways to escape punishment.
Earlier, National Commission for Protection of Child Rights member Yashwant Jain had told India Legal that he felt that the JJB would favour trying the accused as an adult as the murder was planned and cold-blooded.
“Had it been an accident or an act perpetrated in the heat of the moment, the Board might have chosen to treat him as a child. But the accused was fully aware of the consequences of his actions and showed the mental ability of an adult insofar as knowledge as well as planning of the act are concerned,” Jain had said.