4 min readPuneSep 3, 2026 05:19 PM IST
More than two years after an allegedly drunk 17-year-old driving a Porsche killed techies Aneesh Awadhiya and Ashwini Koshta in Pune’s Kalyani Nagar area, Awadhiya’s parents are calling for the juvenile age to be lowered to 16.
Om and Savita Awadhiya, who live in Umaria, Madhya Pradesh, held a press conference in Pune on Thursday to make this appeal.
“We have seen cases in which minors of around 16 years drink and drive cars and cause accidents. Lives are lost. In just a short time, as happened in our case, bail is granted within 15 hours because the accused is a minor. For the victims’ families, however, everything…their entire life…is ruined. My family has experienced this pain,” said Om. He added that the family had written to the police and several government institutions about amending the Juvenile Justice Act.
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Om said that, around the time of the Porsche crash, there was a case of an underage boy who was allegedly at the wheel of his father’s SUV when it crashed into a couple on a scooter in Mumbai. In mid-August, a car allegedly driven at high speed by a 17-year-old in Nagpur killed two of his friends and injured him.
“Some parents don’t think twice before giving expensive cars to underage children. The children seem to think that their parents will get them out if they crash the car or get into trouble. There is little fear of the law,” said Om.
He added that the age limit was being misused in other ways also, citing instances of children in conflict with law in Nagpur and Delhi. “Many gangs recruit minors to carry out criminal activities because the children are protected by law,” said Om.
2 years later, trial yet to begin
At present, the Juvenile Justice Act considers a child to be a minor until they are 18 and focuses on reform and rehabilitation rather than strict punishment for crimes. Amending the law is under the central government’s purview.
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In the Nirbhaya case in which a young woman was gangraped in a moving bus in Delhi in 2012, the youngest accused, a minor, was detained for three years, the maximum legal penalty for a minor at the time, while the adult rapists were hanged.
The high-profile Porsche hit-and-run case has not moved to trial even after two years. “Since most of the accused have got bail, there is no question of their being arrested. Eknath Shinde, when he was the chief minister of Maharashtra, had assured us that the case would be tried in a fast-track court. Now, we do not know why there is such a delay,” said Savita.
Speaking to The Indian Express from his home in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, Suresh Koshta, the father of Ashwini, said, “We found hope when the Supreme Court, while granting bail to the accused, said that the case should be wrapped up soon. But the trial has not started.”
Savita added that the families hope that justice will be delivered. “The judgment should discourage others from allowing children to drive their cars,” she said.