‘She didn't see it as crime': SC refrains from sentencing Pocso convict married to survivor
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday refrained from sentencing a convict under the POCSO Act on the ground that he married the survivor of his sexual assault and remarked that the case highlighted the 'lacunae in our legal system'.
Its verdict said, 'The society judged her, the legal system failed her, and her own family abandoned her. Now, she is at a stage where she is desperate to save her husband. She is emotionally committed to the accused and has become very possessive about her small family. The facts of the case are an eye-opener for everyone. It highlights the lacuna in our legal system.' The survivor was 14 years old at the time of the offence in 2018.
The verdict by a two-judge bench of Justices AS Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan came in a suo motu case the SC initiated in the wake of a Calcutta High Court ruling that had asked adolescent girls to 'control' their sexual urges instead of 'giving in to two minutes of pleasure'. In December 2023, the SC had said that the High Court's comments were sweeping, objectionable, irrelevant, preachy and unwarranted.
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