The Calcutta High Court has 03/02/2023 held that removing a minor victim's pants after she refused to do so herself amounts to an attempt to commit the offence of rape.
The Court was adjudicating upon an appeal passed against a trial court order convicting the appellant under Section 376 (punishment for the offence of rape) read with Section 511 (punishment for attempting to commit crimes punishable with imprisonment for life or another imprisonment) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
Justice Ananya Bandyopadhyay observed that the act of removing the undergarment of the victim and forcibly making her lie down on the ground cannot be for any other reason than to sexually ravish her.
“..asking the victim to remove her pant and in defiance the appellant himself removing it justifiably signifies an attempt to commit the offence of rape. The action of removing the undergarment of the victim covering and protecting her private parts and forcibly made her lie down on the ground cannot be for any other oblique reason but indubitably for the purpose of ravishing her”.
“The appellant had no reason to provide an ice-cream to the minor victim except with an ulterior motive of quenching his sexual gratification. The first stage of enticing the victim with an ice-cream and distancing her to an isolated area was preparatory in nature”, the Court underscored.
“The appellant who could have been the protector owing to his age conducted such reprehensible act towards the minor victim child, which if accomplished in its entirety would have impacted her life inconsolably to bear the wretched stigma throughout her life”, the Court added.
Accordingly, the Court upheld the conviction and sentence of 5-year jail handed down by the concerned trial court for an attempt to commit the offence of rape.
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