"She Was A Juvenile": Supreme Court Frees Woman Convicted In A 24 Year Old Murder Case

The Supreme Court set aside concurrent conviction of a woman accused in a 24 Year Old Murder Case as it found that she was juvenile at the time of incident.

Allowing her appeal, the Court said that the maximum action that could have been taken was of sending her to the special home. But it noticed that she has undergone incarceration for a period of more than eight years, and therefore observed that no purpose will be served by sending her before the Juvenile Justice Board.

The two-Judge Bench of Justice Abhay S. Oka and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan said, “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. Therefore, the appellant ought to have been dealt with in accordance with Section 21 of the 1986 JJ Act. The maximum action which could have been taken against the appellant was of sending her to a special home.”

Senior Advocate Rajesh Pandey appeared for the appellant while Advocate Gautam Narayan appeared for the respondent.

In this case, the issue of juvenility was raised by the appellant in the appeal during the course of hearing by filing an interlocutory application. Therefore, vide an order, the Apex Court had directed the Sessions Court to hold an enquiry into that aspect of issue of juvenility. In terms of the order, the 1st Additional Sessions Judge submitted a finding which recorded that the date of birth of the appellant was September 1, 1982 and, therefore, on June 15, 2000, which was the date of the occurrence of the offence, the age of the appellant was 17 years, 9 months, and 14 days.

The Supreme Court in the above regard observed, “A perusal of the report shows that apart from other documents, reliance has been placed on the entries in the school leaving register of the school last attended by the appellant. This document is of the year 1988. The name of the appellant appears at serial no.369 and her date of birth shown therein is 1st September, 1982. Even the primary certificate examination result-sheet of 1995 shows the same date of birth.”

The Court further took note of the fact that on the date on which the incident constituting the offence took place, the age of the appellant was less than 18 years. It said that 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.

It also said that as per Section 22(1) of the Juvenile Justice Act, 1986, there was a prohibition on sentencing a juvenile to undergo imprisonment and that there is a similar provision under Section 16 of the 2000 JJ Act.

“… the appellant had undergone incarceration for a period of more than eight years. … As the appellant has undergone incarceration for a period of more than eight years, no purpose will be served by sending the appellant before the Juvenile Justice Board”, it concluded.

Accordingly, the Supreme Court allowed the appeal and quashed the impugned judgment.

Cause Title- Pramila v. State of Chhattisgarh (Neutral Citation: 2024 INSC 50)

Appearance:

Appellant: Senior Advocate Sumant Bharadwaj, Advocates Abhishek Pandey, Mahesh Pandey, Chandrika Prasad Mishra, Prashant Kumar Umrao, Nishi Prabha Singh, Prashasti Singh, Swati Surbhi, Mahesh Kumar Tiwari, Lalit Allawadhi, AOR Mridula Ray Bharadwaj and Advocate Tanay Hari Har Lal.

Respondent: Advocates Asmita Singh, Harshit Goel, K.V. Vibu Prasad, and Sujay Jain.

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