In a landmark verdict, a Delhi court has ordered 10-year-prison-term to a 26-year-old man for kidnapping and raping a teenage girl in 2010. Additional Sessions judge Mahesh Chander Gupta awarded the prison term to a Rajasthan’s resident, Rajesh, for kidnapping and raping the 17-year-old school girl. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 32,000 on the convict.

 

The judge stated that the prosecution had established the charges against Rajesh "beyond shadows of all reasonable doubts", and added that "from the testimony of the girl, it is visibly indicated that she was persuaded or lured by the accused".

 

The court held Rajesh guilty of the offences punishable under various sections of the IPC, including 376 (rape), 363 (kidnapping) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy).

 

The Delhi police revealed, the girl was abducted in May 2010 by Rajesh, a victim’s neighbor in the city’s Sultan Puri area. The prosecution asserted that the culprit took the girl to his sister's house in Palam and held her captive. It also alleged that Rajesh's sister and brother in-law gave intoxicating drugs to the teenager and tried to force her into flesh trade.

 

However, the sister and brother-in-law of the accused could not be detained during the probe. The police informed the court that the accused held the girl in a rented house for over a month and abused her during the period. He also repetitively outraged her modesty, the cops said.

 

However, while pleading his innocence he claimed that the girl had left her house on her own and he was being falsely implicated in the case. He also denied the charge that he had raped the girl and said they were in a relationship.

 

The girl informed the court that she got acquainted with Rajesh as he regularly visited the house of one of her tenants. She, however, maintained that she was raped by him. While convicting Rajesh, the judge stated that there was nothing in the girl's statement to suggest that she had any hostility to falsely involve him in the case. Concerning the claim by the accused that the girl was an yielding party and she did not raise any alarm when she was with him, the court observed that it could not falsify the prosecution's case which was proved by "clear, strong and convincing evidence".

 

"When a minor girl has been encouraged and induced with green pastures and has come under the total dominance and inducement of the accused, one is left wandering as to how it is expected that she would gather the courage in such circumstances to raise hue and cry," the judge said.