Khushi, accused in Bikru massacre, declared minor by Juvenile Board

The Juvenile Justice Board in Kanpur has declared that Khushi, wife of slain gangster Amar Dubey, an accused in the Bikru massacre, is a juvenile.

Khushi, who had been married to Amar Dubey just three days before the Bikru massacre took place on July 3, was arrested by the Special Task Force (STF) and has been languishing in jail ever since.

Eight policemen were shot dead by gangster Vikas Dubey and his men on July 3 when they went to the Bikru village to arrest him.

Khushi has been made a co-accused in the incident and booked under sections 302, 307, 394 of IPC and section 7 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act.

Principal Magistrate, Juvenile Justice Board, Kanpur Dehat, Kamalkant Gupta said that in case of a heinous offence alleged to have been committed by a minor, who has completed or is above age of 16 years, the Board shall conduct a preliminary assessment of the accused’s mental and physical capacity to commit such an offence, ability to understand consequences of the crime and circumstances in which it was committed.

The Board may take the assistance of psychologists or psycho-social workers to do the assessment, he said.

Khushi’s lawyer, Shivakant Dikshit, told media persons the girl’s age was 16 years, 10 months and 12 days on the day of the carnage.

Her high school certificate and other documents were enclosed in the affidavit, which shows her birth date as August 21, 2003.

“After hearing the petition, special judge, anti-dacoity, sent the file to the Juvenile Justice Board to ascertain her age. The board, after going through facts declared her juvenile,” he said.

The girl’s father had earlier alleged that police had implicated his minor daughter in the Bikru case.

“She is not an adult and not mature enough to engineer an ambush with the gangster and his aides. We suspect police implicated her and even if my daughter had committed a crime, police should treat her as juvenile,” he had said.

Shortly after Khushi was arrested, Congress leader Jitin Prasada tweeted, “Khushi probably had no choice being married off to Amar and continues to suffer as a widow and facing police harassment.”