Pune Porsche Crash Case: Accused Will Not Be Tried As Adult

The Pune Porsche crash case is in the news again, this time with an interesting set of developments. In the latest turn of events, the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) said that the accused in this case will be tried as a 'Juvenile' and not as an 'adult'.

The teenager was taken into custody by the Pune police last year, after he ran over two IT professionals with his dad's newly bought Porsche Taycan, in an intoxicated state. We will come to the details of this later in this article. The police soon sought that the accused be tried as an adult, even though he was just 17 at that time. The reason for this plea was that he had committed a “heinous” crime of crushing two to death and further attempts to tamper with the evidence and do potential cover-ups.

More than a year later, the JJB has now announced its decision on the same. It rejected the police's plea and stated that the accused would be treated as a juvenile during the trials. For this, the JJB relied on the Supreme Court ruling of Jan 9, 2020, and observed that the offence attributed to the accused cannot be considered 'heinous' under the Juvenile Justice Act.

The apex court had then ruled that 'offences prescribing a maximum sentence of more than seven years but not providing any minimum sentence or providing a minimum sentence of less than seven years, cannot be considered to be 'heinous offence' within the meaning of section 2 (33) of the JJ Act'

The minor in this case, has been charged under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) and 467 (forgery) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Neither of these, the defence argued, has a minimum sentence good enough to qualify as a 'heinous' offence as per the aforementioned ruling. The defence further argued that the child here, lacked any criminal intention and knowledge to commit a crime. He has no prior criminal records either.

The families of the victims are disappointed with the most recent development. Talking to NDTV, Om Prakash Awadhiya, the father of Aneesh Awadhiya, one of the victims, said "it was clear from the beginning what we would get". "A person who was drinking, driving a car, how can he be considered a juvenile... I think there should have been no question about treating him as an adult."- says Suresh Koshta, the father of Ashwini Koshta, the second victim.

The accused in this case, also made headlines after he was granted bail in May last year, on lenient (and bizarre!) terms. He was asked to write a 300-word essay on road safety! This move had stirred massive public outrage and made the internet furious. Following the backlash, the accused was sent to an observation home in Pune. He was released in June.

Pune Porsche Crash: More Details

The crash in question took place on May 19, 2024. The accused, a 17-year old boy and son of one of Pune's most prominent builders, went 'celebrating' his exam results with friends. They partied hard and got heavily drunk. Three hours of liquor bills alone amounted to Rs 48,000. These were later recovered by the police, from the crashed car.

The accused was driving home in his dad's brand-new Porsche Taycan electric car, when he lost control and crashed into a motorcycle. The bike had two on it- both IT professionals- Aneesh Awadhiya and Ashwini Koshta. Both of them failed to survive the crash. The boy was soon arrested and a fierce legal battle began.