Minor pleads not guilty in Delhi gang-rape

The juvenile accused in the December 16 gang-rape and murder of 23-year-old paramedic on Wednesday denied all the charges against him, claiming that he was not a participant in the horrendous crime.

Pleading innocence before the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) presided by Principal Magistrate Geetanjali Goel, the youth refuted the police version in the charge sheet which said he was the most brutal of the six accused people.He claimed that he was not a participant in the crime and had been falsely implicated in the case. The juvenile claimed innocence when the JJB put before him the evidence collected by the police. He said he was himself victimised by his employer and the prime accused Ram Singh, who he said did not pay him for his work.

A native of Uttar Pradesh who moved to Delhi as a 11-year-old and took up menial jobs, the juvenile was one of the six accused arrested after the gang-rape of the girl in a moving bus in which the victim’s male friend was also assaulted.

The juvenile is facing trial before the JJB while the four adult co-accused are being tried before a fast-track court.

The board has recorded the statement of all the six prosecution witnesses against the juvenile. Meanwhile, the fast track court has also completed recording statements of all the 80 prosecution witnesses. The JJB has now fixed the matter to July 5 for final arguments. The paramedic and her 28-year-old friend were assaulted and the girl was  raped when they boarded a bus after a visit to the cinema.

 She died two weeks later in a Singapore hospital.

Ram Singh was found hanging in the Tihar jail in March and the proceedings against him stand abated. Besides him, four adult accused facing trial in the case are Mukesh, Pawan Gupta, Vinay Sharma and Akshay Thakur.