Special court acquits family booked in child marriage case

A special court in Mumbai has acquitted a 24-year-old man and his parents of performing a child marriage and the father of the man of rape charges. The court cited lack of evidence and lack of support from the victim as reasons for the acquittal.

MUMBAI: A special court recently acquitted a 24-year-old Wadala resident and his parents who were booked for performing a child marriage. The father of the 24-year-old was also acquitted of the charge of raping his 16-year-old daughter-in-law multiple times between 2018 and 2019.

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Special judge SC Jadhav acquitted the trio of the charge of performing child marriage for want of adequate evidence. “At the outset, it is to be mentioned that the prime witness, i.e. victim, has not supported the prosecution case. Though she admitted her signature on the FIR, she showed her ignorance about the contents of the FIR (based on her statement). She has denied all suggestions of prosecution,” said the judge.

According to the prosecution, the 16-year-old girl resided with her mother, brother and sister. Her mother works as a maid in Bhakti Park in Wadala. In 2017, the 16-year-old was working in a saree factory when her grandmother passed away. Before passing away, the grandmother had proposed the victim’s marriage to her paternal aunt’s son, however, the victim refused to marry the man chosen by her grandmother.

A few months later, considering her deceased grandmother’s wish to get her granddaughter married, a friend of her maternal aunt approached the victim with the proposal to marry her son. Accordingly, the victim was allegedly forced to marry the 24-year-old man but claimed that after the marriage she learnt that her husband was jobless and alcoholic.

On January 4, 2018, on the birthday of the victim, when she was alone in the house, her father-in-law approached her and asked for sexual favours. She denied and subsequently informed her maternal aunt, who in turn confronted the mother-in-law, who acted completely indifferent to the incident.

On February 24, 2019, the father-in-law raped the teenager when they were alone in the house and threatened to kill her if she informed anybody about it. He raped her again three days later. Following this incident, she informed her mother and lodged a complaint with the Wadala TT Police Station.

The accused were booked for committing an offence punishable under sections 376 (2)(n) (commits rape repeatedly on the same woman), 498-A (husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty), 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, sections 6 (Aggravated penetrative sexual assault), 10 (Aggravated sexual assault) and 12 (sexual harassment) of the POCSO Act, 2012 and sections 9 (Punishment for solemnising a child marriage) and 10 (Punishment for male adult marrying a child) of the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006.