Shamli (Uttar
Pradesh), September 10: A local court of Western Uttar Pradesh’s Shamli, has
sentenced a 48-year-old man to life imprisonment for raping his own biological
minor daughter. Describing the crime as ‘heinous’, Hon’ble Additional Sessions
Judge Mumtaz Ali, felt it would send a wrong message to the society if such
crimes were not dealt with harsh punishment.
Local police
had registered the case against the father following a complaint lodged by the victim’s
mother, who told the court that she “dealt with abuses and torture for years in
her marriage but could not bear what her daughter was going through.”
The victim’s
mother while narrating the ordeal said that she was a victim of 'domestic
violence since the day of marriage', adding that her husband never allowed
their six daughters to complete their education and married off two of them
while they were still in their teens.
She further
said, “I cried all night when my daughter told me about what happened to her.
In the morning, the first thing I did was to call the police. I faced taunts
from my in-laws. Even the neighbors did not spare me. I stood up to all this
for the next 16 months. All I want is severe punishment for my husband.”
Special Public
Prosecutor O.P. Kaushik told reporters, “The mother of the girl had filed a
complaint at Thana Bhawan Police Station on April 29, 2020. She was sleeping
with her daughters in another room when her husband, at around three in the
night, called the 15-year-old girl on the pretext of massaging his feet, saying
he was in pain. Then he committed the crime and threatened her not to disclose
it to anyone.”
The Shamli
police had registered the case under IPC sections 377 (carnal intercourse
against the order of nature with any man, woman, or animal) and 506 (criminal
intimidation) and under relevant sections of the POCSO Act, the government
lawyer said.
"The
case took long as the court remained closed for months amid pandemic. We
produced seven witnesses in this case, including the daughters and wife of the
accused," he said.