30-year-old gets 7 years in jail for raping minor

A 30-year-old man has been sentenced to seven years in prison for raping a 14-year-old girl in Mumbai in 2013. The man threatened the girl to marry him or be sent to a dance bar. The court found the survivor's testimony to be trustworthy and corroborated by medical evidence.

MUMBAI: A special court designated under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) on Thursday sentenced a 30-year-old man to seven years in prison for raping a 14-year-old girl in 2013. The man along with his mother threatened the minor to marry the accused man or else she will be sent to a dance bar.

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As per the case registered by the Andheri police station on October 9, 2013, the accused and the minor girl resided in the same locality and knew each other.

The family of the accused used to speak with the grandmother of the girl. The accused had expressed his love for the girl and proposed to her, but she rejected his advances.

After 10-15 days, the parents of the accused visited the victim’s grandmother with a marriage proposal which she rejected. Alarmed by the proposal, she started going to drop and pick up the minor from school.

During the Ganpati festival, the accused called the girl out to meet, but she got scared and informed her grandmother. On September 5, 2013, when the girl was playing in the garden, around 7pm, the accused approached her and told her that he wants to speak.

The accused forcibly caught her hand and dragged her to a garden nearby. Later, under the pretext of dropping her home, the accused took her to Marol, where he raped her.

The family of the girl began searching for her as she didn’t come home and registered a missing persons complaint.

The accused took her to his mother, who told her that her family would send her to a dance bar when she grows up if she did not marry her son and asked her to go to the MIDC police station and inform the police that she wanted to marry the accused.

A month later, the girl revealed to her family that the accused had raped her on the day when he took her out. The girl claimed that she was scared to reveal anything to anyone, and the FIR was registered based on her complaint.

The accused, in his defense, claimed that he was falsely implicated. The court, however, said that there was no reason to disbelieve the testimony of the survivor, as it was found to be trustworthy and was corroborated by medical evidence.