Hyderabad gang-rape: For maximum punishment, cops want 5 minors tried as adults

New Delhi, Jun 09: The Hyderabad police will push for the five under 18 accused in the gang-rape case to be tried as adults so that they do not get away with a minor punishment. Out of the six accused persons who have been arrested, 5 are under the age of 18.

The police will make out a case to try the five as major citing the 2015 amendment to the Juvenile Justice Act. The amendment says that if the person in the age group of 18-16 has committed a heinous crime which attracts an minimum imprisonment of seven years in jail they can be tried as a major. A juvenile otherwise can be send to a remand home not exceeding a period of three years.

All the five minors in the case are above 16 years. One of them is barely a month under 18 years.

While under the amended law the police can make a push for the accused to be tried as majors, the final decision would lie with the court. The court would take into account the mental and physical capacity, ability to understand consequences and the circumstances in which the offence was committed before taking a decision.

The girl and her six attackers had met at a party in a pub in Hyderabad's Jubilee Hills on May 28. The minors had booked the hall for a party before their schools reopened.

They had made the bookings at Rs 900 to Rs 1,000 per head and sold the tickets for Rs 1,300 each. The girl was at the party with a friend who had left early. She later met the group that assaulted her the same evening inside a vehicle.