In a bid to escape death penalty, Pakistani terrorist Ajmal Kasab on Monday urged the Bombay High Court to refer his case to medical boards to determine whether he was a juvenile and to study his psychological profile as well as mental frame of mind.
His lawyers Amin Solkar and Farhana Shah filed two separate petitions -- one seeking to determine his age and the other to know his mental state -- before justices Ranjana Desai and V M More who said they would hear the issues on Tuesday.
This is the second time Kasab has raised the plea of being a juvenile. In the trial court earlier, he had argued that he was a minor and was put to ossification test which determined that he was above 20 years and a major.
The petitions further requested the court to appoint an NGO working in India and Pakistan to make a home study on Kasab, his family background and the circumstances which made him participate in the 26/11 terror attacks for which he was sentenced to death by the trial court.
Kasab’s lawyers argued that Juvenile Justice Act (JJA) was enacted in 2000 to incorporate India’s international obligations under the Conventions on the Rights of the Child (CRC) into domestic law. One of the provisions of CRC was an absolute ban on passing a death sentence on a juvenile. This ban was incorporated into Indian law vide section 16 of JJA.
