{1} IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE OF BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD CRIMINAL WRIT PETITION NO.243 OF 2010 Pawankumar s/o Sibban Kewat Age-22 years, Occ-Nil R/o Sonuwali, Tq-Nevtermer, Dist-Maharajgunj (UP) PETITIONER VERSUS The State of Maharashtra RESPONDENT ....... Mr. S.S.Kazi, Advocate for the petitioner Mr. K.S.Patil, APP for respondent State ....... [CORAM : P.V.HARDAS, AND A.V.POTDAR, J.J.] DATE : 18th November 2010 ORAL JUDGMENT (PER P.V.HARDAS, J.): 1. Rule. Rule returnable forthwith. With the consent of the learned counsel for the parties, this petition is heard finally at the stage of admission. 2. This petition, under Article 226 of the Constitution of {2} India, has been filed by the petitioner seeking his release on the grounds that the petitioner was a juvenile on the date of the incident. The petitioner alleges that his date of birth is 17.07.1987 and the incident had taken place on 01.06.2005. According to the petitioner he was aged 17 years 10 months and 17 days on the date of the incident and consequently was a juvenile in the light of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act. In support of his plea, that the petitioner was a juvenile, the petitioner has filed document at Annexure “C” to the petition. The aforesaid document is a copy of a leaving certificate and it appears that the name of the petitioner was entered in the school at serial No.902 in the admission register. In response to the notice issued by this Court, the respondent has filed affidavit in reply and in the affidavit in reply it is stated that the name of the petitioner does not appear at serial No.902 in the admission register and in fact name of some other person appears. The respondent, thus, raised a doubt in respect of the genuineness of the said leaving certificate filed by the petitioner. 3. The aforesaid disputed question of fact cannot be decided in the writ petition and consequently we feel that the appropriate forum for deciding this question, by affording opportunity to the parties to lead evidence, would be the Juvenile Justice Board. We accordingly, partly allow this petition and refer the matter to the Juvenile Justice Board for deciding the question of age of the petitioner as on 01.06.2005 and passing appropriate {3} orders in accordance with law. 4. Rule is made absolute on the terms indicated above with no order as to costs. [A.V.POTDAR, J.] [P.V.HARDAS, J.] drp/B10/cwp243-10