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Solicitor General Tushar Mehta while appearing in an appeal before the Bombay High Court today against the acquittal of Former Editor in Chief of  Tehelka, Tarun Tejpal, raised serious objections to the observations made by the Additional Sessions Judge Kshama Joshi in the said judgement.

SGI Mehta before the single bench of Justice SC Gupte argued that the judgement discloses the name of the victim and her husband along with their email ids.

Mehta further argued that the Court had observed that the victim  had approached Senior Advocate Indira Jaising and “other experts” thereby giving rise to the possibility of doctoring of events. On this Mehta said that “approaching a lawyer of her repute, according to me that was the right thing to do”.

He however raised strong objections on accusing “a lawyer of her repute of doctoring.” 

The Goa court had observed in the Judgement that the victim had approached the National Commission of Women and even spoke to Senior Advocate Indira Jaising who guided her in drafting the complaint. The Court further noted that Jaisingh’s name was saved as “Brahmastra” in the prosecutrix phone “which translates to 'most powerful weapon'.”

The Court in this regard said, "With the help of experts, there may be a possibility of doctoring events or adding of incidents. Advocate for the accused has thus rightly submitted that the deposition of the prosecutrix has to be scrutinised from that angle”.

Hearing the submissions made by the SG, the High Court directed the trial court to redact the two references to the victim’s husband and her email id in the judgment while uploading the judgment. further the reference to the name of the mother of the victim mentioned is also directed to be redacted.

On SG’s request that the matter be heard next week since amendments were required to be made in the appeal and the copy of the trial court judgement was made available on May 25, the bench has listed the matter for hearing on June 2.

Tejpal was acquitted on May 21 by the Goa Court, however a copy of the judgement was made available on May 25.

A complaint was filed against Tejpal for sexually assaulting his colleague in a hotel in Goa in November 2013 . Tejpal was charged for the offences punishable under sections 341 (wrongful restraint), 342 (wrongful confinement), 354 (assault or criminal force with intent to outrage modesty), 354-A (sexual harassment), 354-B (assault or use of criminal force to woman with intent to disrobe), 376(2)(f) (person in a position of authority over women, committing rape) and 376(2)k) (rape by a person in a position of control) of the Indian Penal Code.  

After his acquittal, the state filed an appeal before the Goa bench of the High Court of Bombay.