First intercourse not rape if consensual sexual acts follow
NAGPUR: In yet another interesting verdict, the Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court has ruled that "series of sexual acts take away and destroy the version of victim that first incident was by way of rape". The judgment was delivered by a single-judge bench of justice Ambadas Joshi. He had recently also ruled that "sexual relations with a woman under a mistaken belief that the man would eventually marry her can't be a termed as rape" while acquitting a man accused for raping a 16-year-old.
The court acquitted petitioner Anwar Khan Iqbal Khan, a medical representative from Amravati, and set aside the Nagpur session's court's judgment which had sentenced him to seven years rigorous imprisonment along with Rs 20,000 fine two years back for allegedly raping a girl repeatedly.
"Seen from any angle, present case is not a case of mistaken belief being the cause of giving consent for sexual intercourse recurrently and for over two years," the judge observed while delivering the verdict.
Prosecution said, Khan was charged with raping the victim Shaila (name changed) from April 14 to May 5, 2004. He was accused of cheating the victim by fraudulently and dishonestly inducing her to sexual intercourse for over two years by giving an assurance of marriage.
The victim knew the accused as both worked in the same company. The accused called her to his hotel room for the first time in Nagpur and raped her. He promised to marry her when she started weeping and threatened to commit suicide. Thereafter, Khan called her to hotels in Amravati and Yavatmal, and sexually exploited Shaila with assurances of marriage. This continued till the accused finally refused to marry her.
The defence argued that the complainant was crazy and had been running after the accused and it is a case of one-sided passion. Citing some high court and Supreme Court verdicts, they said that consent given by the victim on promise to marry cannot be said to be consent given under misconception.
After arguments from both sides, the high court observed that it is very much a possibility that the victim was unaware of the need for self-restraint and chastity, and therefore she had succumbed to sexual passion induced due to promise of marriage.
"The victim is of the age of maturity and it can't be believed that she does not have knowledge of the consequences of sex, particularly after one abortion which she claims followed the first two acts of rape on her," the judge stated.
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