Pilibhit: A special Pocso court in Pilibhit sentenced a 28-year-old man to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment for raping a 17-year-old Class 12 student after kidnapping her on the pretext of getting her a job. He was also sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for kidnapping, with both sentences set to run concurrently, and levied a fine of Rs 30,000.
The incident took place on Feb 2, 2019. In her statement before the court, she said the man stopped her while she was returning home from school and asked her to accompany him to Rudrapur in neighbouring Uttarakhand, promising to get her a job paying nearly Rs 20,000 a month. The survivor managed to escape in the early hours of Feb 6 while the man was asleep and eventually returned to Pilibhit. After she narrated what had happened to her family and police, Section 376 ( rape ) of the IPC and Sections 3 and 4 of the Pocso Act were added to the case. The accused was arrested soon after and the police filed a chargesheet on Feb 28, 2019.
The survivor and the convict belonged to the same village. During the trial, the defence relied on the medical examination, which did not record fresh injuries consistent with the assault alleged by the survivor. The prosecution argued that the absence of such findings could not outweigh her credible and consistent account.
When the survivor failed to return home on Feb 2 and could not be traced, her father lodged a complaint the following day.
She said the man knew about her family’s poor financial condition and tried to persuade her with the job offer. When she insisted on informing her family first, he “kidnapped her and took her to Rudrapur, where she was held captive for nearly four days and repeatedly raped”. He also threatened to kill her whenever she screamed for help.
He also referred to Pratap vs State of UP (2021) while delivering the judgment.
Judge Tribhuvan Nath Paswan relied on previous judgments holding that a “rape survivor’s credible testimony cannot be discarded solely because medical evidence does not independently establish rape”.