India: 16-year-old killer denied bail in Ryan Murder Case of seven-year-old Pradyuman Thakur
The 16-year-old student, accused of killing seven-year-old Pradyuman Thakur at the Ryan International School, won’t be released from custody as a Gurgaon court today rejected his bail plea for the first time since the Juvenile Justice Board’s ruling that the accused be treated as an adult.
Judge Jasbir Singh Kundu also imposed a fine of Rs.21,000 for “wasting the court’s time” in “baseless litigation” and directed the teen’s father to deposit the amount.
“The conduct of the appellant (accused) indicates that he is taking court proceedings for a joy ride. He has indulged in wasting precious court time in baseless litigation on account of which seven court hearings have gone down the drain.
“This court finds no irregularities, illegalities or impropriety in the impunged order dated December 15, 2017 passed by JJB, dismissing default bail application,” the court said.
The court said the accused’s ulterior motive in filing the present application was aimed to divert the track of the ongoing investigation or delay the probe and then “grab” the default bail.
Pradyuman, a seven-year-old student of the same school, was found with his throat slit in the school’s washroom on September 8 last year, stabbed in the neck twice.
The Gurgaon Police had claimed the crime was committed by a school bus conductor, which was later refuted by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
The CCTV footage from cameras outside the school washroom showed the teen was the last one to leave the washroom, the agency said.
He was sent to a juvenile home in November and has been there since then.
The teen, reportedly under psychiatric evaluation for a year over anger issues, had been questioned several times and his account kept changing, sources say.
In November 2017, the CBI, which is investigating the case, arrested a class XI student aged 16 from Ryan International School for the murder of Pradyuman. CBI said that the boy killed Pradyuman to postpone the examination and parents meeting in the school. It is reported that the boy made the confession in front of his father but has since retracted the confession which he said was coerced.