Man gets 10 years in jail for sexually assaulting 13-year-old girl

MUMBAI: A special POCSO court on Saturday convicted a 48-year-old man from Chembur and sentenced him to ten years of imprisonment under the POCSO Act and SC/ST Act after he was found guilty of sexually assaulting his neighbour’s 13-year-old daughter.
Special sessions judge Priya P Bankar said, “The child sexual abuse cases demonstrate the inhumane mindset of the accused. The children are easy prey, due to their tender age, physical vulnerabilities and inexperience of life and society.”
The incident occurred in August 2016, when the accused entered the girl’s house while she was sleeping with her elder sister. Her parents left the house to drop their youngest daughter at school, and then for their respective jobs. In that gap, the accused neighbour entered their house pulled the sleeping minor from the sofa, and sexually assaulted her.
Woken up by the screams of the victim, her sister immediately called out the accused, after which he ran away. The elder sister called her grandmother, after which their parents were informed of the incident.
The defence submitted that the elder sister of the victim made up a false story to implicate him after he found out about her love affair and threatened to inform her parents. However, the victim’s mother said that a false story was cooked up by the accused and denied any suggestion regarding the involvement of her elder daughter’s boyfriend.
After listening to both sides, the court observed that the accused was aware that the victim’s parents had left the house at 7 am and the sisters were alone in the house. It observed that there is sufficient evidence on record to support the prosecution case about the sexual assault and penetrative sexual assault upon the minor victim girl. Further, the court observed that the accused committed the act with the full knowledge that the girl belonged to a scheduled caste.
The court observed that the incident would have an adverse impact on the victim girl, her family members and society. “The incident is going to affect the mental health and future of the minor victim girl, and she will not be able to forget it. Such an incident causes terror in people’s minds and leaves a scar in the minds of the victims for a longer time,” observed the session judge.