But Justice Ravindra Bhat was presented with a First Information Report (FIR) the other day in which the police implicated two minor sisters for misbehaving with their brother's wife Babita seven years ago.

The accused Pinky and Asha were eight and 12 in July 2001, when the Mongolpuri police had registered the FIR.

Discharging the two from the case, Justice Bhat noted: "By no stretch of the imagination could these young girls of tender age be accused of the offence (dowry harassment), much less be implicated in the chargesheet. Yet the police sent them up for further inquiry and trial."

The two sisters – with Asha married and settled in Rajasthan at present –underwent a court trial before the Juvenile Justice Board, until the judge quashed further criminal proceedings against them.

The Juvenile Board blamed the protracted trial of the girls to a backlog of 4,000 cases before it -- "1000 of which dealt with heinous crimes".

The judge was critical of the police. He noted: " …all those who are sought to be implicated are routinely made an accused, thus beginning their agony of facing long drawn-out trials."

Justice Bhat's attention was drawn to two specific paragraphs in the FIR, which could only implicate the sisters as accused in the crime.

In the first paragraph, the police said Pinky and Asha had joined adults in the house "to taunt Babita for bringing in less and dowry and started treating her with cruelty".

The second paragraph alleged the minors teamed up with family members to mercilessly beat their sister-in-law and "even broke her hand before turning her out of the house in just the clothes she was wearing".

Justice Bhat's order read: "No act done by a child aged under seven is ever deemed an offence. An act done by a child above seven years of age and below 12, who has not attained sufficient maturity of understanding to judge the nature and consequences of his conduct, is also not an offence."

This case, the judge said, had violated the Parliamentary concern to protect children in conflict with law from the "stigma attached to them, which often mars their growth, seriously affects their education and in some instances blights their future life".

"Childhood encapsulates the most treasured part of one's life. In this case, the court can safely assume that important chunks of these two minor girls' childhood was deprived by the callous disregard of their rights by the police," the court said.