Supreme Court highlights struggles for sensitivity in crimes against women; restores conviction in rape of minor

Justice Sharma said despite the importance of procedural sanctity, it is always a matter of utter failure for the system as a whole when a culprit manages to walk free by entangling the victim in misapplication of procedural rules, without the knowledge of the victim and without any control of the victim.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday restored conviction and sentence of life term imposed upon two men for repeated rape of a minor girl, observing that the struggle for sensitivity towards offences against women, children and other marginalised groups passes through various phases of evolution, “whereas, the end goal is most desirable, the journey is not always a pleasant one”.

A bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Satish Chandra Sharma allowed the appeal of the father of the girl and set aside the Patna High Court's judgment, saying natural variations, errors and inconsistencies are not to be elevated to the standard of a reasonable doubt or to hold that the prosecution has failed.

"There is nothing like perfect evidence in a court and in fact, perfection is often suggestive of tutoring and manufacturing of evidence. The availability of evidence as well as the quality of evidence are not open to judgment on any pre-determined parameters. For, these aspects not only depend upon the quality of investigation but also upon the societal circumstances prevalent in the area of crime," the bench said.

They also depend upon the level of awareness, not only of the persons involved in the case but also of the members of the locality who often appear as witnesses, the court added.

"Therefore, the courts must be alive to the state of affairs on the ground and in that backdrop, it must examine whether the inconsistencies and gaps have been properly explained or not," the bench said.

Justice Sharma, who authored the judgment on behalf of the bench, said despite the importance of procedural sanctity, it is always a matter of utter failure for the system as a whole when a culprit, that too of a heinous sexual offence, manages to walk free by entangling the victim in misapplication of procedural rules, without the knowledge of the victim and without any control of the victim.

“The present case presents one such illustration from a place called Piro, District Bhojpur, Bihar,” the court said.

The court pointed out that every instance of acquittal of an actual culprit revolts against the sense of security of the society and acts as a blot on the criminal justice system.

“Therefore, not only should no innocent face punishment for something that he has not done, but equally, no culprit should manage an acquittal on the basis of unreasonable doubts and misapplication of procedure,” the bench said in the 35-page judgment.

Setting aside the 2024 verdict of the High Court, the court said that it often comes across cases where loose acquittals are recorded on the basis of minor inconsistencies, contradictions and deficiencies by elevating them to the standard of reasonable doubts.

The bench noted that a reasonable doubt is one that renders the version of the prosecution as improbable, and leads the court to believe in the existence and probability of an alternate version of the facts.

“It is a serious doubt which must be backed by reason. The underlying foundation of the principle of beyond reasonable doubt is that no innocent should face punishment for a crime that he has not done," the court said.

But a flipside of it, is that at times, owing to a mis-application of this principle, actual culprits manage to find their way out of the clutches of law. Such misapplication of this principle, resulting in culprits walking free by taking benefit of doubt, is equally dangerous for the society, the bench said.

The court said in the present case, a fairly consistent and creditworthy case of the prosecution has been discarded on what could only be termed as misapplication of procedure.

The court noted that in the present case, even if it is believed that the age of the victim was not determined to the hilt, the trial court had concluded that the victim was aged between 12 to 15 years at the relevant point of time and thus, was a minor.

“It was done and, in our opinion, rightly so, on the basis of the unrebutted oral and documentary evidence,” the court said.

The bench noted that interestingly, the respondent neither claimed that the victim was not a minor at any point of time nor led any evidence to that effect.

“Once the minority of the victim was beyond doubt, the special protection of POCSO Act ought not to have been diluted by raising a fictitious doubt regarding the precise age of the victim,” the bench said.

The court pointed out, in rural regions, discrepancies in the educational and identification documents are not unknown and, in such circumstances, the courts must be sensitive to the ground realities of the society, so as to ensure that the intent of the law is not suppressed and protections created by the legislature reach the intended persons in their right spirit.

The bench said the victim was scared to report the incident to anyone as she was threatened by the respondents, if not for the pregnancy and deterioration of health, she would not have reported either.

The court held the testimony of the victim was fairly consistent and there was no reasonable ground to doubt it.

As per the case, a few months after Holi, the victim started feeling unwell and upon examination in July 2016, she was found to be three months pregnant. She then disclosed that she was raped by the two accused about three-four months ago.