Mumbai man gets 20 years in jail for raping minor daughter

Mumbai city news: A special POCSO court sentenced the 40-year-old last week. The girl, now 17, told the court her father raped her first in 2011, when she was just 11

A man has been sentenced to 20 years of rigourous imprisonment for raping his minor daughter multiple times in 2011 and 2014 and threatening to kill her if she spoke about it.

PICTURE FOR REPRESENTATION

A special Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO ) court sentenced the 40-year-old last week. The girl, now 17, told the court her father raped her first in 2011, when she was just 11, during a vacation at her uncle’s house.

While convicting him, the court relied heavily on the girl’s statement, which matched with her stepmother’s and grandmother’s.

She said she lost her mother when she was an infant and had since been living with her grandmother. Her father had remarried.

READ: My father raped me, but cops refused to believe me, says 17-year-old

After the abuse at her uncle’s house, the girl said her father tried to rape her again a few weeks later, when they were at her grandmother’s house, but stopped as he feared getting caught. The girl said that after that, her father was jailed in an attempt to murder case, between 2011 and 2014. She told the court that as soon as he was released, the harassment started again, until he was finally caught in July 2014.

While convicting the man and sentencing him, the court relied on the girl’s statement, which was corroborated by her stepmother’s and grandmother’s.

In his defense, the father claimed the girl was implicating him because he had objected to her relationship with a boy from her school. But the father could not prove this defence in court.

The court said they found the girl’s testimony reliable. They observed the statement she gave to this court was the same as the one she gave to a magistrate as soon as the case was filed in 2014 and also matched with what she told the doctor who examined her. “This inspires confidence and that itself is sufficient to punish the accused,” the court said.