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Synopsis

The Delhi High Court on Monday awarded 20 years imprisonment to two men for gang-raping a Nigerian woman in 2014. Court said that mere absence of traces of semen during the DNA analysis does not falsify the victim's claim and penetration was sufficient to prove the offence of rape.

The division bench of Justice Mukta Gupta and Justice Poonam A. Bamba modified the jail term of the two convicts from 30 years to 20 years noting that one of them was unmarried while the other had to look after his children and parents, and the possibility of their reformation could not be ruled out.

One of the grounds on which the woman’s testimony was assailed was that despite her claim that the men (appellants) raped her, the DNA analysis report did not support the claim.

 “However, absence of semen which could on DNA analysis account for the alleles of the two appellants does not discredit the version of the prosecutrix that she was raped by the two appellants one after another. For an offence of rape, it is sufficient to prove that there was penetration”, the bench held.

“Considering the evidence on record and that the version of the prosecutrix is not only wholly reliable but is also supported by other facts and circumstances, lending a further assurance to her version, this Court finds no error in the impugned judgment of conviction”, the court said.

The prosecution’s case was that the woman was returning from a friend’s party at the District Centre in Janakpuri on the intervening night of June 18-19, 2014. While she was looking for an auto, a car stopped near her. The two men abducted her and took her to the house of the sister of one of them, where they both raped her. After committing the crime, they put her back into the car and dumped her near a metro pillar while taking away her bag having her mobile phone.

The court noted, “She was pulled inside the car and thus, she would not have noted the car number and could not have identified the car as it would have taken a few seconds or few minutes to the kidnappers to have kidnapped the prosecutrix, giving her no time to see the car number or details of the car”.

“Further, while taking the route to the place where she was raped at night, it would have been difficult for a person who is not an ordinary resident, to identify the roads, which is further compounded by the fact that as per the prosecutrix, her head was bowed down in the car so that nobody could see her”, it further noted.

The two men (appellants) argued that they had been implicated due to mistaken identity. After considering the woman’s testimony, the high court remarked, “No motive can be attributed to the prosecutrix to falsely implicate the appellants.”

“Further, there is also corroboration to the fact that the house where the rape was committed belonged to the sister and brother-in-law of the appellant Raj Kumar who appeared in the witness box as PW-11 and PW-18 respectively”, the court added.

Considering the woman’s deposition, the court opined that it was evident that she was kidnapped by the two appellants (men) at around 11 pm at night when she was looking for an auto-rickshaw.

Conclusively, the bench ordered, “….thus this Court deems it fit to modify the period of sentence for offence punishable under Section 376-D IPC to rigorous imprisonment for a period of 20 years along with the fine of ₹40,000/-, in default whereof, to undergo simple imprisonment for 6 months. The sentence for the remaining offence(s) would remain the same as awarded by the learned Trial Court. Thus, modifying the sentence for offence punishable under Section 376-D IPC, the impugned order on sentence is also upheld”.

Accordingly, the appeal was disposed of.

Case Title: Raj Kumar & Anr. v. State