Evidence Of Survivors Inspires Confidence: Bombay HC Upholds Conviction Of Man For Raping Five Minor Girls
|The Bombay High Court upheld the conviction of a man accused of sexually assaulting five minor girls.
The Court was dealing with a criminal appeal filed by the accused against the judgment and order of conviction and sentence passed by the Additional Sessions Judge.
A Division Bench comprising Justice Revati Mohite Dere and Justice Prithviraj K. Chavan observed, “Considering the aforesaid evidence, it is evident that all the five victim survivors were sexually assaulted by the appellant. Not only the evidence of the survivors inspires confidence but the same stands duly corroborated by the medical evidence and the evidence of PW6 who had witnessed the incident of sexual assault. All the survivors were minors, between the age group of 8 to 13 years. Under Section 29 of the POCSO Act there is a presumption. The said presumption has not been rebutted by the appellant.”
Advocate Laxmi Raman appeared for the appellant/accused while APP Gauri S. Rao appeared for the respondent/State. Amicus Curiae A.R. Kapadnis appeared for the complainant.
Brief Facts -
The appellant (accused) and complainant were close relatives as she was the wife of the brother-in-law of the appellant. As per the prosecution case, all the victim girls were between the age group 8 years to 13 years and living in the same village as the accused. The alleged incident of sexual assault by the accused on the victim girls went on for about two years. It is only when the complainant saw the accused sexually assaulting one of the victim girls, she was informed of the same.
Pursuantly, the complainant lodged an FIR against the accused alleging offences punishable under Sections 376(f), 354, 323, and 506 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Sections 4 and 8 of the Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO Act). The Trial Court convicted the accused and sentenced him to suffer life imprisonment along with a fine of Rs. 50,000/-. Being aggrieved, he was before the High Court.
The High Court in view of the above facts, noted, “On examination, it was found that there was a small tear at 4 O'clock position with presence of slight inflammation around the opening of hymen. The inflammation indicated recent sexual assault. PW8 also found that the hymen was not totally ruptured and as such, opined that there was evidence of recent vaginal penetration.”
The Court said that, since there is no challenge by the appellant to the ages of the survivors, it is not necessary to deal with the said evidence, since the said evidence also shows that the victim girls were all minors at the relevant time.
“… we do not find any infirmity in the impugned judgment and order of conviction and sentence and as such, uphold the conviction and sentence imposed by the trial court”, it added.
Accordingly, the High Court dismissed the appeal and upheld the conviction of the accused.
Cause Title- Ramesh Krishna Gopnur v. The State of Maharashtra (Neutral Citation: 2024:BHC-AS:36723-DB)