INNOCENCE OF AGE ENDS WHERE HEINOUS CRIME BEGINS

The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 introduced the Section
15 preliminary assessment mechanism enabling children aged sixteen to eighteen accused
of heinous offences to be tried as adults — a paradigm shift from the absolute age shield
upheld by the Supreme Court in Salil Bali v. Union of India (2013). This article critically
examines the constitutional, procedural, and institutional adequacy of this mechanism.
Drawing upon Articles 14, 15(3), 20(1), 21, and 39(f) of the Constitution of India, 1950,
doctrinal analysis of post-2015 Supreme Court and High Court jurisprudence — including
Shilpa Mittal v. State (NCT of Delhi) (2020), Gaurav Kumar v. State of Haryana (2019),
Vijay Sharma v. Union of India (2018), and Abuzar Hossain v. State of West Bengal
(2012) — and comparative jurisprudence from the United States, United Kingdom,
Germany, and South Africa, the article argues that the conditioned accountability model
is constitutionally valid in principle but procedurally underdeveloped and dispositionally
compromised in practice. The principal reform mandate lies not in tightening the adult
trial mechanism but in transforming India's rehabilitation infrastructure. Concrete
legislative, judicial, and institutional reforms are advanced, including amendment to
Section 2(33), statutory sentencing guidelines, mandatory victim participation rights, and
the adoption of evidence-based rehabilitation programming. The article concludes that
legal reform and rehabilitative deepening are not competing objectives but inseparable
elements of a constitutionally and humanely adequate juvenile justice response.