Police to send minor before juvenile body after kin’s plea in Delhi HC

The direction came after the Delhi Police told a bench of justices Siddharth Mridul and Rajnish Bhatnagar that the investigators were not aware that the accused was a minor when he was arrested and produced before a duty magistrate on Sunday.

The Delhi high court on Monday directed the city police to produce a juvenile, accused in the communal clashes in Jahangirpuri, before the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) by 4.30pm after the minor’s sister-in-law filed a plea claiming that he was being kept in illegal detention.

The magistrate remanded the juvenile in police custody for interrogation for one day.

The direction came after the Delhi Police told a bench of justices Siddharth Mridul and Rajnish Bhatnagar that the investigators were not aware that the accused was a minor when he was arrested and produced before a duty magistrate on Sunday. The magistrate remanded the juvenile in police custody for interrogation for one day.

The court, while hearing a habeas corpus petition filed by the minor’s sister-in-law against his arrest, said that even though the charges against the teenager were serious and he was not arrested for “loitering or jaywalking’’ but for being a part of the mob. However, it was incumbent on the police to produce him before the JJB in line with the law.

Section 10 of the JJ Act requires a minor in conflict with the law under the charge of a special juvenile police unit or a child welfare police officer who should produce the child before JJB within 24 hours of apprehension. This provision also bars the police from keeping the minor in a police lockup or in a jail.