Noida: A special Pocso court rejected the bail application of a man accused of repeatedly raping and impregnating a minor, holding that while the Allahabad high court granted bail against an earlier application, the order pertained to offences relatively less grave in nature.The applicant, a Surajpur resident accused in a rape case registered in Sept 2025, was facing charges after an FIR was registered at Surajpur police station on Sept 13 last year, a month after the minor went missing on Aug 18 last year.On April 23 this year, he was granted bail by the Allahabad High Court for charges filed against him under BNS sections 137(2) (kidnapping), 65(1) (rape of a woman under 16 years) and Pocso Act Section 3/4 (penetrative sexual assault against children under 18 years).Police subsequently added more charges under BNS Section 87 (kidnapping, abducting, or inducing a woman to compel her marriage or force her into illicit intercourse), and Pocso Act sections 5j(ii) (when a child is impregnated as a consequence of sexual assault) and 5l (offence of repeated sexual assault) in the remand sheet, and he moved the Pocso court for bail.During the proceedings before the Pocso court, the counsel pointed out that the FIR was filed after a gap of a month, and that his first bail application was already allowed by the high court. He also argued that his client was falsely implicated, as he was not named in the original FIR that was filed against unknown persons. The special public prosecutor, however, informed the court that newer circumstances had emerged during the investigation and additional sections were added.Taking the case diary, charge sheet and other material on record, the court found that the victim’s date of birth was Jan 1, 2011, and was 14 years old during the alleged time of the offence. The court also relied on the survivor’s statement recorded under BNSS sections 180 and 183.In her Section 180 statement, the girl said that she accompanied the accused, who then committed a wrong act with her. In her Section 183 statement, she clarified that the accused threatened her, took her to Bihar, forcibly established a physical relationship with her, leaving her pregnant, and also confined her.Additional sessions judge Abhishek Pandey observed that while the high court granted the applicant bail, those were under sections that were relatively minor offences in comparison with the newer sections for which the second bail was sought.“At this stage, there does not appear any reason to disbelieve the statement given by the victim on oath before the magistrate’s court,” the court held.The court noted that the high court’s earlier bail order pertained to lesser offences, and that the subsequent addition of sections relating to heinous offences constituted materially changed circumstances.Finding no sufficient ground to release the accused, the court rejected the bail application. “Therefore, taking into consideration the facts and circumstances of the case and nature of offence, this court, without touching on the merits of the case, does not find it appropriate to enlarge the applicant on bail in this second bail application,” it said.
