Thane: A special Pocso court in Thane has acquitted a man accused of raping a seven-year-old girl and outraging the modesty of her 73-year-old grandmother, with the court observing that the story of aggravated penetrative sexual assault “seems to be an afterthought” introduced to make the offence appear more serious.Special judge G T Pawar delivered the verdict in a case where the accused faced charges under IPC Sections 376, 354, and 452, and Section 6 of Pocso Act in connection with an alleged incident on Oct 3, 2021. The prosecution had claimed that the accused trespassed into the house while the victims were sleeping, molested the grandmother, and sexually assaulted the child. However, the defense successfully argued that the case was falsely fabricated owing to a prior dispute over water leakage from a plant pot. The court noted stark contradictions between the child’s statement to the Child Welfare Committee and her statement to police, pointing towards tutoring. It also flagged a critical procedural lapse—the investigating officer was never examined during trial before his death, severely prejudicing the defence. The court held that the right to bring on record contradictions in witness statements made before the investigating officer is a valuable right of the accused, and its denial amounted to serious infirmity in the trial. Rejecting the prosecution’s plea to invoke statutory presumption of guilt under Section 29 of Pocso Act, the court ruled that the prosecution had failed to prove the foundational facts necessary to attract the presumption, and ordered the acquittal.
