The Jharkhand High Court set aside the order directing a juvenile to be tried as an adult in the POCSO case and held that the Board is obliged to take the assistance of experienced psychologists or psycho-social workers to try the juvenile as an adult but in the present case, the holistic evaluation of the child was not made and the assistant of the experienced psychologists or psycho-social worker was not taken.
Brief Facts:
The petitioner, accused under Section 6 of the POCSO Act and Section 376 of the IPC filed the present petition under Section 102 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 against the order passed by the trial court wherein the appeal filed by the petitioner was dismissed and the finding of the board which held that the child had full knowledge of the consequence of the offence as an adult and held that his trial should be conducted as an adult was upheld.
Contentions of the Applicant:
The learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner contended that the Medical Board assessed the age of the petitioner as 16 to 18 years and JJ Board did not consider the fact that after adjusting the variation of plus/minus to his age would come around 15 years. It was further contended that the court did not take into consideration the age as shown in the Adhar Card where the age of the petitioner was around 13 years.
Observations of the Court:
The court referred to the judgment in Ram Suresh Singh vs. Prabhat Singh @ Chhotu Singh and another to state that there is only a bone ossification test for determination of the age of the juvenile and as per medical evidence the average age is shown to be 16 to 18 years and as such the benefit of margin of two years less may be given to the juvenile herein child in conflict with the law.
The court further referred to the provisions of Section 94 of the JJ Act and stated that the Adhar Card cannot be the basis to determine the age and the board accordingly adopted the procedure of medical examination by the Medical Board which assessed the age to be 16 to 18 years.
The court further observed that the Board had not taken the assistance of the experienced psychologists or psycho-social worker or any other experts to reach the conclusion that the trial of the petitioner should be conducted as an adult and the preliminary assessment requires holistic evaluation for such an assessment the Board may take the assistance of experienced psychologists where the Board constituted does not comprise the child psychotics and the word 'may' would operate in a mandatory form and the Board would be obliged to take the assistance of experienced psychologists or psycho-social worker to try the juvenile as an adult but in the present case, the holistic evaluation of the child was not made and the assistant of the experienced psychologists or psycho-social worker was not taken.
The decision of the Court:
The court allowed the petition, set aside the impugned order and remitted the matter back to the JJ Board to decide afresh the preliminary assessment of the petitioner
Case Title: Raj Kumar Turi vs. The State of Jharkhand
Coram: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Subhash Chand
Case No.: Cr. Revision No.129 of 2023
Advocate for the Applicant: Mrs. Jasvindar Mazumdar
Advocate for the Respondent: Mr. Satish Prasad
Read Judgment @LatestLaws.com
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