DHANAJI RAMCHANDRA SURWASE Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present Appeal is preferred by the Accused Nos. 1 and 2 for challenging the judgment and order dated 15th September, 2004 under which the Appellants have been convicted for the offences punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 and Section 324 read with Section 34 and Section 341 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code. The second Appellant (second Accused) filed Criminal Application No. 1224 of 2012 raising a contention that he was a juvenile in conflict with law as defined under Section 2(1) of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000 (hereinafter referred to as "the said Act"). The contention raised in the Application on the basis of the School Leaving Certificate is that the date of birth of the second Appellant is 4th August, 1986. The learned counsel appearing for the Applicant relied upon the record of the school such as General Register, School Leaving Certificate, etc. We may note here that under the order dated 11th March, 2010 passed by this Court, the second Appellant was allowed to lead evidence before the Trial Court on the issue of his date of birth. The learned counsel appearing for the Applicant has invited our attention to the evidence of the witnesses examined by the Applicant on the basis of a liberty granted by this Court. She submitted that the school record has been prepared on the basis of the information supplied by the father of the second Appellant on 9th June, 1992 which discloses the date of birth of the second Appellant as 4th August, 1986. She also invited our attention to the order dated 14th August, 2012 passed by this Court and pointed out that on the basis of the said order, the first Appellant who is the father of the second Appellant has been examined as a witness to prove the date of birth. Her submission is that the evidence of the first Appellant proves that he supplied information to the school authority on 9th June, 1992 disclosing the date of birth of the second Appellant as 4th August, 1986. The learned counsel, therefore, submitted that as the date of the incident is 11th November, 2002, on that date, the second Appellant was a juvenile in conflict with law.

(2.) The learned APP invited our attention to the birth register maintained by the Village Panchayat and submitted that there is overwriting in the date of birth and someone has tried to convert the year of birth from 1984 to 1986. The submission is that the birth register maintained by the Gram Panchayat has been tampered.

(3.) We have given careful consideration to the submissions. The inquiry as regards the date of birth was required to be held as per Section 7(A) of the said Act. The procedure for holding the inquiry has been laid down in the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Rules, 2007. Sub-rule (3) of Rule 12 is material which lays down that for determining the age, an inquiry shall be conducted by the Court by seeking evidence by obtaining three documents specified in Clause (a) of Sub-section (3) thereof. The first document is the matriculation or equivalent certification and the second document is the date of birth certificate from the school (other than a play school) first attended, and only in the absence of these two documents that the birth certificate given by the Corporation or Panchayat is required to be obtained.