A court in the Thane district of Maharashtra has cleared a 33-year-old man who was charged with abducting and raping a minor girl in Thane back in 2013. The conviction was handed on February 3 by Special POCSO court judge V V Virkar, who gave the accused the benefit of the doubt and cited a lack of evidence, reported PTI. 

According to the report, the man was charged under Indian Penal Code Sections 363 (kidnapping), 366­A (procuration of minor girl), and 376(3) (rape on a woman under 16 years of age), in addition to the provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. He lived in the Brahmananda Nagar neighbourhood in the Bhiwandi area of Thane. The girl, who was about 16 at the time, was allegedly abducted and abused between February 14 and September of that year.

“Though, as rightly argued on behalf of the prosecution, merely because the prosecutrix and her father turned hostile, the accused cannot be exonerated and it is required to be seen what is the other evidence on record,” the judge said in her order which was made available on Tuesday.

Per the PTI report, the court noted that despite the prosecution`s arguments emphasising the importance of the victim`s evidence and her father`s complaint, both the girl and her father became hostile during the trial and failed to substantiate the complaint`s contents. Furthermore, the investigating officer`s testimony provided insufficient evidence to convict the defendants.

“But, so far as the contents of the complaint are concerned, the testimony of the prosecutrix and her father, who is the complainant is material and important and as mentioned above, both have turned hostile and have not proven the contents of the complaint,” the court said.

The court emphasised the lack of tangible evidence linking the accused to the claimed crimes, claiming that there was no evidence of kidnapping or sexual assault. As a result, the court decided in favour of the accused, concluding that none of the claims could be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

There is absolutely no evidence to prove that the accused kidnapped the prosecutrix from the lawful guardianship of her parents and committed rape and penetrative sexual assault on her. Therefore, none of the allegations can be held to have been proved against the accused, the court said.

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