Eur J Forensic Sci ● Apr-Jun 2017 ● Vol 4 ● Issue 2 11 European Journal of Forensic Sciences DOI: 10.5455/ejfs.228548 www.ejfs.co.uk INTRODUCTION Personal identification is preliminary concern of medicolegal and forensic investigation. There are various methods by which the personal identification can be performed such as anthropometry, fingerprints, foot impression, bite mark, lip print, and ear print. Stature estimation is an important part of forensic investigations. Stature is anatomically complex that includes the dimensions of legs, pelvis, vertebral column, and skull, and the contribution of each of these to the total varies in different individuals and also in different populations [1-8]. Stature estimation is an important constraint in identification of mutilated and skeletal remains which could be helpful in the investigation of the identity of victims of mass disasters and fatal assaults cases [9]. Some previous studies have shown the relationship between various parts of the body with the stature and sex [10-15]. In forensic investigations, sex, age, and stature of an individual can be determined by the measurement of hand and foot dimension [10-15]. Determination of stature is a major concern in forensic medicine and forensic anthropology which establishes the personal identity of the victims as often required [16]. Stature estimation is basically based on the principle that height of an individual has a definite and linear relationship with various body parts of an individual. Previous studies have been established that stature can be reconstructed from various body parts and individual bones with reasonable accuracy. Earlier studies have employed skull and cephalo-facial anthropometry [17-24], long bones and their fragments [25-29], scapula and hip bones [30-33], and small bones of hand and foot [34] for the estimation of stature. It has been shown that the height estimation by the measurement of various long bones has been attempted by several workers with variable degree of Original Research Stature estimation from footprint: A study on Central Indian population Ritesh K. Shukla 1,4 , Anand S. Lodha 2 , Subal Das 3 ABSTRACT Introduction: Personal identification is preliminary concern of medico-legal and forensic investigation. There are various methods including Anthropometry, Fingerprints, foot imprint, bite mark, lip print, ear print by the help of which personal identification can be performed. In India, the bare foot imprints are frequently recovered at the crime scene and stature of a person can be estimated using foot imprint method, so analysis of bare foot imprints are often a necessity for forensic investigation. Materials and Methods: In this study, we made an attempt to reconstruct the stature using foot imprints (footprint and foot outline) method. The 200 samples of male and female age ranges from 18 to 30 years were collected from urban area of Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India. Footprint and outline methods were employed in this study, to correlate the size (length) of foot-imprints with the stature (height) of an individual. The foot-print length observed best correlation with stature (0.876 & 0.872 for males, 0.802 & 0.797 for females and 0.899 & 0.897 for the combined population) using right and left foot respectively. Furthermore, the foot-outline length was also exhibited similar correlation with stature (0.876 & 0.870 for males, 0.794 & 0.788 for females and 0.891 & 0.888 for the combined population) using right and left foot respectively. Results and Conclusions: Our results revealed that linear regression analysis played an important role to estimate stature from measurements of foot-prints and foot outlines. These linear regression analyses not only provide the highest reliability and accuracy in stature estimation but also accelerate the forensic investigation process where the footprints present as evidences. KEY WORDS: Forensic sciences, forensic anthropology, footprint, foot imprints, foot outline, stature 1 Department of Forensic Science, Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya, Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India, 2 Department of Forensic Science, School of Sciences, Gujarat University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India, 3 Department of Anthropology, Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya, Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India, 4 Division ofBiological & Life Sciences,School of Arts & Sciences, Ahmedabad University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India A Ad dd dr re es ss s f fo or r c co or rr re es sp po on nd de en nc ce e: : Ritesh K. Shukla, Division of Biological & Life Sciences, School of Arts & Sciences, Ahmedabad University, Ahmedabad 380009, Gujarat, India. E-mail: ritesh.shukla@ ahduni.edu.in Received: Received: May 11, 2016 Accepted: Accepted: September 21, 2016 e e- -P Pu ub bl li is sh he ed d: : March 16, 2017