The main legal point established in the judgment is the significance of documentary evidence, particularly school records, in determining the age of a juvenile in conflict with the law, as outlined in the Juvenile Justice Act and the Delhi Juvenile Justice Rules.

1. By this petition filed under Section 397 of Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (hereinafter referred to as Cr. P. C.) the State seeks to challenge the impugned order dated 11.3.2011 passed by the Court of Additional Sessions Judge, Delhi whereby the learned Additional Sessions Judge declared the accused respondent a juvenile at the time of commission of the alleged offence.

2. Briefly stating the facts of the present case, the responded is accused in FIR bearing No. 439/09 registered under Sections 302/397/34 IPC and FIR No. 529/09. To prove his juvenility on the date of commission of the alleged offence i.e. on 30.10.2009, the accused respondent had filed before the Court of Additional Sessions Judge, the copy of Scholars Register and Transfer Certificate Form issued by Smt. Chabbo Devi, Laghu Madhyamic Vidhyalaya, Budhiyapur, Pratapgarh, U.P.as Ex. AW 1/A which reflected the date of birth of the accused respondent as 16.11.1993. To prove the said school record, the accused produced AW1, Shri Prem Chand Pandey, the head master of Smt. Chabbo Devi, Laghu Madhyamic Vidhyalaya, Budhiyapur, Pratapgarh, U.P. who produced the original admission register of the school wherein the name of the accused was found registered at Sr. No. 1796 and his date of birth in the relevant column as 16.11.1993. AW 1 also deposed that the accused was admitted in the school on the basis of the affidavit of the father of the accused, namely Mr. Dharam Raj Pandey, reflecting the date of birth of the accused as 16.11.1993. (Placed on record as AW1/B)

3. Learned Trial Court after referring to the documents placed on record by the accused and the examination of AW1 reached to the conclusion that the school records produced by the accused were genuine, authentic and reliable piece of evidence for determining the age of the accused respondent. The court also directed, as an abundant precaution, the ossification test of the accused to reaffirm its finding as to the juvenility of the accused on date of commission of offence on the basis of the documents placed on record. As per the ossification test which was conducted by a duly constituted medical board on 2.2.2011, the accused was found between 20-22 years of age at the time of his medical examination. The learned Trial Court relying upon the said test and after giving benefit of two years to the petitioner, thus, reaffirmed its decision reached on the basis of the documents placed on record by the accused and held him to be of less than 18 years of age at the time of commission of the alleged offence.

4. Assailing the said order, Mr. Naveen Sharma, learned APP for the State submitted that the order dated 11.3.2011 passed by the learned Trial Court is manifestly wrong, bad in law and contrary to the facts and evidence on record. He submitted that the learned trial court ignored the fact that during cross examination of AW1, he had admitted that the school was only a recognized school and that at the time of admission, the accused was looking 1-2 years older and when he confirmed the date of birth of the accused, the father of the accused told that the date of birth given by him was correct.

5. He further submitted that the trial court also glossed over the fact that the accused

told his age as 21 years at the time of arrest in the present case and 19 years when arrested in 2007 in another case registered under FIR No. 420/07.

6. He also submitted that the record of the school regarding the date of birth of the accused is not a reliable piece of evidence because the date of birth of the accused was entered in the school record only on the basis of the affidavit of the father of the accused and not on the basis of any authentic certificate issued by any registrar of birth, municipality or panchayat etc.

7. He further submitted that the learned trial court committed an error in giving the margin of two years in favour of the accused while calculating the age of the accused at the time of commission o