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The Delhi High Court has found the Father guilty of a ghastly crime against the Young Daughter.
In a groundbreaking decision which reveals the judiciary’s dedication to the protection of vulnerable children, the Delhi High Court on Tuesday sentenced a man to a life imprisonment for the perpetration of aggravated penetrative sexual assault against his daughter who was 10 years old. The verdict was done by a Division Bench which included Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain, who found the accused, who is called PDD, guilty of Section 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO Act) and Sections 506 and 323 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The Court’s verdict had been a contradiction of the previous acquittal issued by the trial court, thus, it was the significant event in the ongoing fight for the justice of the victims of sexual crimes in the family. The High Court condemned the trial court’s verdict, saying that it had “neglected and misunderstood the evidence” and that the conclusions made were based on the inferences that were a fallacy. Thus the crucial observation was the vindication of the accused and the conviction of the defendant for his actions.
The case comprised the horrifying details of the depression of the father who was the culprit in the sexual assault that he did to the victim who was 10 year old aged for a period of two years. The misuse came to light when the victim of the age 12 approached the police on January 19, 2013, and reported that her father had been abusing her. She narrated an incident from the previous day when her father, in a state of inebriation, had also battered her mother and brother. This daring action of the girl who confronted the robber was the one which triggered the legal proceedings, although the first trial led to the man’s acquittal.
The Justices Kait and Jain, in their detailed judgment, stressed on the reliability of the victim’s testimony, which they called “full confidence.” The bench also said that the trial court made a mistake in giving too much importance to the delay in reporting the crimes and the small contradictions in the testimonies, which they saw as insignificant. The High Court bench stated that the discipline and coherence of the victim’s statement and the confirmation by the other family members gave the ” truth was clear.
The court also put out of the play any hypotheses that the accusations might have been induced or invented through the family feuds, stressing that the seriousness and the constantness of the abuse disproved such a thing. The judges shared a powerful feelings about the sad irony that the daughter was hoping for security from her father, but face huge acts of violence.
This case also showed the systemic problems which are the difficulties that the victims have to overcome to make claims of sexual abuse, especially when the perpetrator is a relative. The bench acknowledged the fact that the victim and her mother had no hesitation at the time of reporting the incidents because of their vulnerable situation but blamed the earlier intervention for the sparing the child from the prolonged suffering.
The procedures are planned to resume on May 24, when the court will listen to the arguments about the sentence of PDD. This following phase will probably be about the selection of an appropriate punishment which will be capable of indicating the intensity of the crime which caused the victim and which will have a long-term effect on the victim.
This is a proof of how the judicial system is concerned with the crimes against children which are treated with the required seriousness. In addition, it is a vital message of the need for alertness and persistent fight for the children protection from abuse and the law restrictions on the criminals.
