Allahabad High Court: In an appeal against the judgment passed by Trial Court, convicting the appellant/convict under Section 376 of the Penal Code, 1860 (‘IPC’) to undergo six years rigorous imprisonment, Samit Gopal, J. said that the prosecution has proved the case beyond reasonable doubt and the version of the first information report (‘FIR’) and the prosecutrix regarding her rape does not get dented throughout the case. Further, the medical evidence corroborates with the prosecution version. Thus, the Court upheld the Trial Court’s order of conviction and directed the convict to be taken into custody to serve the sentence.
In the case at hand, one afternoon, the prosecutrix aged about 10 years was mowing grass in the field, when the convict forcibly caught hold of her and committed rape on her.
The Court said that the medical examination of the prosecutrix shows injuries on her vagina, thus the factum of rape does not remain uncorroborative, it finds support from the medical evidence. Further, it said that the defence has admitted the genuineness of these documents: FIR, the recovery memo of blood-stained clothes of prosecutrix, her medical examination report, the supplementary medical examination report, the site plan of the place of occurrence and the charge sheet. Thus, now stating that the non-examination of the doctor and the investigating officer by the prosecution would render the prosecution story and the entire trial doubtful does not hold good.
The Court said that the age of the convict (68 years) will have no effect on the question of sentence and conviction as it is trite law that inadequacy of sentence is not in the interest of justice and if a person has been convicted and there is evidence beyond reasonable doubt about the same adequate sentence must be awarded to him. Further, it said that a relationship is not sufficient to discredit a witness unless there is motive to give false evidence to spare the real culprit and falsely implicate an innocent person, thus rejected the argument that one of the witnesses is the brother of the prosecutrix.
Placing reliance on State of Maharashtra v. Chandraprakash Kewalchand Jain, (1990) 1 SCC 550 said that the testimony of a rape victim is like the evidence of an injured complainant or witness. If it is found to be reliable, by itself, it may be sufficient to convict the accused and no corroboration of her testimony is required.
The Court took note of State of Rajasthan v. Banwari Lal, 2022 SCC OnLine SC 428, and while applying the principles of law with regards to the sentencing of the convict, said that lack of sufficient time and age of the accused cannot be a ground to extend any benefit to him in the crime committed by him. Thus, the Court upheld his conviction.
[Om Prakash v State of U.P., 2022 SCC OnLine All 769, decided on 15-11-2022]
Advocates who appeared in this case:
Counsel for Petitioner- Advocate Puran Chandra Joshi;
Advocate D.N. Wali;
Advocate K.K. Misra;
Advocate Pwan Chandra;
Advocate R.K. Dhama;
Advocate Sudhir Dixit;
Counsel for Respondent- Government Advocate.
*Apoorva Goel, Editorial Assistant has reported this brief.
