LUDHIANA: When it comes to percentage of juveniles held guilty for offences under the Indian Penal code (IPC) and Special and Local Laws (SLL), Ludhiana has less such percentage as compared to Amritsar and other cities of the state, but is higher than that of Chandigarh in 2019. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) suggests slight increase in pending cases against juveniles for such crimes in 2019 as compared to the year before.
As per the latest NCRB report, percentage of juveniles held guilty for crimes under IPC and SLL in 2019 was 66.7% for Ludhiana, which is less as compared to Amritsar, which had a percentage at 78.6% in the same year. Chandigarh had a rate at just 45.1% in the year. The percentage of juveniles held guilty for crimes under IPC and SLL for 33 metropolitan cities of the country was 84.2% in 2019.
As per the NCRB data, whereas the total number of juveniles apprehended was 182, the total number of cases disposed of was 87. Of such cases, 42 juveniles were awarded imprisonment, whereas 16 of them were dealt with fine and 29 juveniles were acquitted or discharged by the court.
The data suggests that as compared to earlier years, starting 2016, the percentage of juveniles held guilty had mostly been witnessing a fall. Whereas such percentage was a whopping 92.1% in 2016, the percentage fell to 82.8% in 2017 before increasing to 84.1% in 2018 and then again reaching a low value in 2019.
The data of last many years suggests that pending cases for disposal had increased from just 16 in 2016 to 136 the next year and then fell to 92 in 2018 before increasing to 95 in 2019.
Legal experts say that the approach of courts in such cases is reformatory. “In such cases, court normally takes a view to reform a juvenile so that he doesn’t suffer in future. The court also takes into account the state of mind of the accused at the time of occurrence of crime. Also many times, evidence doesn’t come in such cases,” said senior advocate Yogesh Khanna. He added that the pending cases had increased as there was only one such court in Ludhiana and given the population of the district and volume of cases, the number of such courts should be increased.
Sham Sunder Ahuja, secretary, District Bar Association (DBA), and a senior lawyer, said that juveniles could be declared guilty even if court took reformatory view. He added that if percentage of guilty was falling, it was because the prosecution couldn’t prove its case.