The State of Madhya Pradesh vs Rekha @ Kunwar

B.D. Rathi, J.—Heard on admission. This application for grant of leave to appeal has been preferred u/s 378(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter referred to as "the Code") being aggrieved with the judgment dated 16/08/2012 passed by the Sessions Judge, Panna, in Sessions Trial No. 44/2011, whereby respondent Nos. 1 Rekha @ Tej Kunwar & 3 Usha Tiwari have been acquitted of the offences punishable under Sections 363, 366-A & 372 of the Indian Penal Code ("IPC" for short) and respondent Nos. 4 Ashok Kumar and respondent No. 5 Rajababu Shivhare have been acquitted of the offence punishable u/s 376(2)(g) of the IPC and respondent No. 2 Uttam Shrivastava has been acquitted of the offences punishable under Sections 363, 366-A, 372 & 376(2)(g) of the IPC.

Prosecution case, in brief, is that respondents Rekha, Usha Tiwari and Uttam, in the month of February, 2010 kidnapped the prosecutrix and for the purpose of prostitution gave her on hire whereas Rajababu, Ashok Kumar and Uttam Shrivastava subjected the prosecutrix to rape one after other. Prosecutrix had submitted an application before the Deputy Inspector General of Police, Chhatarpur on which investigation was conducted. After completion of investigation, charge-sheet was filed.

Learned Government Advocate submitted that the impugned judgment was passed without proper appreciation of evidence on record and the same deserved to be interfered with.

Having regard to the arguments advanced by the learned Government Advocate, impugned judgment and record of the trial Court were perused.

Admittedly, prosecutrix was more than 18 years of age during the relevant period. Trial Court after appreciation of the entire evidence on record, found that prosecutrix had extensively travelled with the respondents to various places viz. Chhatarpur, Allahabad and Assam, but did not inform the incident to anyone nor raised any objection despite having sufficient opportunity. Moreover, the factum of her traveling to various places was not mentioned by her in the report (Ex.P/5), lodged by her. There were material contradictions in her court statement and police statement. Premlal Barman (PW4), father of the prosecutrix, deposed that he had received the call of the prosecutrix, who had informed him that she was at Chhatarpur and on going to Chhatarpur, he had asked the prosecutrix to return with him, who in turn had denied. Premlal was declared hostile by the prosecution. Dr. Meena Namdeo (PW9), who had examined the prosecutrix and prepared the report (Ex.P/12), did not notice any injury on her private parts and opined that prosecutrix was habitual of sexual intercourse. Moreover, the trial Court found that parents of the prosecutrix had not lodged any missing person report and it was quite unnatural that they remained silent for a period of seven months despite knowing her whereabouts. In the aforesaid premises, the trial Court found that the prosecution had failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

We agree with the findings recorded by the trial Court that prosecution has failed to prove it''s case beyond reasonable doubt.

It is well settled that the judgment of acquittal should not be disturbed unless the conclusions drawn on the basis of evidence brought on record are found to be grossly unreasonable or manifestly perverse or palpably unsustainable.

Taking into consideration the reasons assigned on the face of evidence on record establishing the aforesaid facts and circumstances, the view taken by the learned trial Court was apparently a possible view. As such, no interference is called for with the order of acquittal in question. The application, being devoid of merit and substance, stands dismissed.