Brief Facts
- The appellant and the co-accused were tried by the Trial Court, for the offences punishable under Sections 302and 394 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (hereinafter being referred to as ‘IPC’) and Section 27(2) of the Arms Act, 1959.
- The trial Court, vide judgment dated 9th April, 2013, convicted the appellant and the co-accused for the offences stated above and qua the charge under Section 302IPC, awarded death sentence to them.
- That even before the case was committed, the appellant had moved an application under Section 7-A of the Juvenile Justice(Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000(hereinafter, being referred to as JJ Act, 2000) before the Trial Court claiming that he was a juvenile as on the date of the incident. In the said application, reliance was placed by the appellant on his own horoscope. However, the Trial Court rejected the said application.
- When the matter was committed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate to the trial Court, a fresh petition under Section 7-Aof the JJ Act, 2000 was filed by the appellant claiming himself to be a juvenile in conflict with law which was rejected considering the fact that earlier the Chief
Judicial Magistrate had rejected a similar application preferred by the appellant. - Even in the appeal before the High Court, a pertinent plea was raised on behalf of the appellant that he was a juvenile on the date of the incident and thus, the proceedings undertaken against him in the trial Court were vitiated. However, the High Court also failed to advert to the said prayer.
- Aggrieved by the order passed by the Divisional Bench of the High Court and the order passed by the third single judge of the High Court, the Appellant filed the present appeal before the Supreme Court.
Issues
- Whether the trial court was required to conduct a proper inquiry to determine the claim of juvenility under JJ Act, 2000?
Held
- The Supreme Court directed the Additional Sessions Judge, Darbhanga to conduct a thorough inquiry to determine the age/date of birth of the appellant in accordance with the procedure provided under the JJ Act, 2015and the rules framed thereunder. The findings of the court are as under:
- In case the Trial Court is unable to reach to a logical conclusion based on the documents/certificates placed on record during the course of the inquiry, it may, as a last resort, get conducted the ossification test of the appellant keeping in view the observations made by this Court in the case of Vinod Katara vs. State of Uttar Pradesh, AIR 2022 SC 4771.
- Inquiry was directed to be completed within 12 weeks and report was inquiry was to be sent to the Supreme Court for further proceedings in the pending appeal.
Proper inquiry was not conducted by the lower courts
- In the present case, the appellant applied at the earliest point of time raising the claim of juvenility based on a horoscope before the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate. The said application was rejected. However, before the trial Court, the birth certificate was presented and a plea for determination of age was raised. Learned trial Court rejected the said prayer by observing that even though the birth certificate was issued in the year 1995, the same was not presented along with the application filed earlier before the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate.
- On going through the record, we find that proper inquiry in accordance with the provisions of the JJ Act, 2000or the JJ Act, 2015 was not carried out so to consider the prayer made by the appellant to be treated as juvenile e on the date of the incident even though the plea was raised at the earliest opportunity. It can be said without a cavil of doubt that the plea of juvenility raised by the appellant could not have been thrown out without conducting proper inquiry.
- The Station House Officer of the police station concerned shall provide full assistance to the learned first Additional Sessions Judge in the process of collection of documents/evidence so as to facilitate the inquiry. Proper opportunity to participate in the proceedings shall be provided to the accused as well as the prosecution
Relevant Para No.
- 14, 15 and17