Supreme Court Acquits Woman In 23 Year Old Murder Case After Finding Her To Be A Juvenile At The Time Of Offence

Setting-aside the concurring finding of the High Court and the Trial Court, the Bench of Justices Abhay Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan, noted that at the time of occurrence of the offence, the accused was juvenile, and therefore, no punishment could be imposed on the accused in view of the Juvenile Justice Act.

“Thus, on the date of occurrence of the offence, the appellant was a juvenile…The maximum action which could have been taken against the appellant was of sending her to a special home.”

In this case, the accused had already undergone incarceration for a period of more than eight years as a juvenile.

Briefly put, one Pramila-accused was convicted for committing an offence of murder (date of offence being 15^th June, 2000) and was sentenced to undergo life-imprisonment by the trial court. Challenging the decision of the trial court, the accused preferred an appeal before the High Court that maintained the sentence of the accused while dismissing the appeal.

It is against the impugned order of the High Court; the present criminal appeal was preferred by the accused before the Supreme Court.

During the course of hearing of the appeal before the Supreme Court, the accused took a plea of 'juvenility' at the time of occurrence of the offence. After perusing the record of documents proving the date of birth of the accused, the court found that the accused was juvenile at the time of occurrence of offence.

“Therefore, we have to proceed on the footing that on the date on which the incident constituting the offence took place, the age of the appellant was less than 18 years.”

The court noted that the accused case squarely falls under the old Juvenile Justice Act, 1986 which defines juvenile girl as someone who has not attained the age of eighteen years.

“The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000 (for short, “the 2000 JJ Act”) was admittedly not in force when the incident occurred. Therefore, the case will be governed by the Juvenile Justice Act, 1986 (for short, “the 1986 JJ Act”). Under clause (h) of Section 2 of the 1986 JJ Act, a 'juvenile' has been defined to mean a boy who has not attained the age of sixteen years or a girl who has not attained the age of eighteen years. Thus, on the date of occurrence of the offence, the appellant was a juvenile.”

The age of the appellant was 17 years, 09 months and 14 days on the date of the offence.

The court further noted that the imposition of the sentence of life-imprisonment upon the accused is not justified as maximum punishment under the JJ Act is to send her to a special home for up to three years.

“In the case of a girl of sixteen years of age, she could have been sent to a special home for a period of not less than three years. As per Section 22(1) of the 1986 JJ Act, there was a prohibition on sentencing a juvenile to undergo imprisonment. There is a similar provision under Section 16 of the 2000 JJ Act.”,

After taking a note of the eight-year incarceration suffered by the accused, the court declined to send the accused before the Juvenile Justice Board.

“Hence, the present Appeal must succeed and the impugned judgment and order dated 3rd May, 2010 passed by the High Court and the impugned judgment and order dated 30th June, 2003 passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Ramanujganj, District Sarguja, Chhattisgarh, are hereby quashed and set aside only insofar as the appellant (accused no.2) is concerned.”, the court noted in the operative part of the order.

Case Details: PRAMILA VERSUS STATE OF CHHATTISGARH

Citation : 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 57

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