32-year-old man sentenced to 10-year jail for raping 12-year-old girl | Mumbai news

MUMBAI: A special POCSO court in Dindoshi on August 6 sentenced a 32-year-old man to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment for sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl at her home in Jarimari, Saki Naka.

Munawar Shafiur Rahman Shaikh, a cook by profession, initially used to live near the girl’s house at Sion Koliwada but began staying with her family at their new home in Jarimari from 2016. The girl’s mother considered Shaikh a brother, so she allowed him to stay in their house. The prosecution stated that the survivor’s elder sister continued staying at Sion Koliwada since she did not like Shaikh living with the family. The family includes the survivor, her mother and her elder sister.

According to the prosecution, the incident came to light when the minor girl recounted the events to her elder sister when she visited the latter’s house in March 2018. She told her sister that Shaikh took advantage of their mother’s absence and sexually harassed her on March 12 , 2017, at around 10 pm, while she was getting ready to sleep. The accused is alleged to have forcefully removed her clothes and sexually assaulted her.

Subsequently, the elder sister took the help of Youth Childline NGO and lodged a complaint against the accused on March 23, 2018. During cross-examination, the survivor said she had problems with Shaikh staying at their house but had no option but to live with her mother and the accused at Jarimari.

The defense said that the medical evidence does not support the allegation of rape, submitting that the medical officer did not examine the survivor for sexual assault. The medical officer, during his cross examination, said that he did not do the examination since the incident had occurred a year ago. However, he had mentioned that sexual violence could not be ruled out.

Special POCSO judge Nandkishore More observed, “Even if the doctor has not medically examined the victim, it would not throw or completely discard the prosecution story. The evidence of the prosecution witnesses was found fully trustworthy and there is no reason to doubt genuineness thereof.”

On the one-year gap, the court observed, “Having considered the dominant position of the accused in the house, because the mother of the victim was favoring the accused’s stay with them, the victim might not have collected the courage to disclose the incident with their mother.”

The court convicted Shaikh under Sections 376 (2) of the IPC (dealing with aggravated form of rape) and under Section 6 of the Protection Of Children from Sexual Offenses Act (POCSO) and sentenced him to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment. Section 6 of the POCSO act observes that whoever commits a sexual assault shall be punished with imprisonment for a minimum term of 10 years. In addition, the court directed Shaikh to pay a compensation amount ₹5000 to the survivor and her family.