The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the proceedings in a case where the Gurugram Juvenile Justice Board was to reconsider whether a juvenile accused of murdering a seven-year-old can be tried as an adult, PTI reported.

The child was found with his throat slit in a toilet at a private school in Gurugram on September 8, 2017. The accused, a 16-year-old student of the same school, was detained days after the incident.

A bench of Justices RF Nariman and Navin Sinha directed that status quo be maintained in the proceedings of the Juvenile Justice Board and posted the matter for further hearing on January 21. The Punjab and Haryana High Court had on October 11 set aside the board’s 2017 order that the minor accused be tried as an adult and had given it six weeks to take a fresh decision.

The Supreme Court also issued notices to the accused teenager and the Central Bureau of Investigation seeking their response to a plea filed by the victim’s father. He had challenged the High Court’s order on the ground that it was illegal and contrary to the law’s established procedure. The plea had claimed that the High Court order wrongly dismissed the findings of the Juvenile Justice Board as well as the sessions court, which had concluded that the juvenile be treated as an adult, The Times of India reported.