Ramachandran And ANR. v. The State

IN THE HIGH COURT AT CALCUTTA

CRIMINAL REVISIONAL JURISDICTION [CIRCUIT BENCH AT PORT BLAIR] ******** PRESENT: HON'BLE JUSTICE MOUSHUMI BHATTACHARYA CRR /18/2022 Ramachandran and another ... Petitioners

Versus

The State ... Respondents For the petitioner : Mr. D. Ilango For the State : Mr. Sumit Karmakar Heard on : 17.08.2022 Judgment on : 18.08.2022 Moushumi Bhattacharya, J.

1.

The instant criminal revision arises out of an order dated 10.06.2022 passed by learned Sessions Judge, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Port Blair. By the impugned order, the petition filed by the petitioners for discharge under Section 227 of The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 was rejected. 2.

The ground for rejecting the petition for discharge is that the Investigating Officer could not collect any medical evidence save and except the oral evidence of the victim as the alleged occurrence took place 25/30 years before the complaint of the victim. The alleged offence is of sexual assault being committed

by the petitioners on the victim. The particulars of the alleged offence would appear from the charge sheet filed before the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Port Blair on 31.12.2017. 3.

Learned counsel appearing for the revisionist relies on the relevant parts of the charge sheet as well as the complaint made by the victim girl. Counsel submits that the charge sheet was filed against the petitioners solely on the basis of the complaint and an undated phone conversation.

4.

Learned counsel appearing for the State submits that the matter involves disputed questions of fact as revealed from the charge sheet and that the testimony of the victim is sufficient for proceeding against the accused persons/ petitioners. Counsel submits that the trial should continue for determining the true facts.

5.

The facts before the Court are startling to say the least. It is evident from the impugned order that evidence of the victim is the only ground for rejecting the petition for discharge. The evidence is a complaint made by the victim to the Administration for not taking any action on the complaint for 4 years "due to high political influence" (words used in the complaint). The complaint is essentially against the petitioners for allegedly forcing the victim to marry the first petitioner/revisionist, Ramachandran. According to the victim, the said Ramachandran was impotent and the victim was forced

to do household chores for Ramachandran and his family members.

6.

The victim alleges that Ramachandran and his parents tortured the victim. The victim incidentally mentions the names of the petitioners as allegedly forcing the victim into giving sexual favours when the victim was six years of age. The victim complains of forced sexual activity together with other allegations of being deprived of a "Modischeme". The complaint is clearly a confused mix-up of allegations against the petitioners, the family member of Ramachandran as well as other unnamed persons.

7.

The complaint was surprisingly made when the victim was more than 37 years old but refers to alleged physical relations between the victim and the petitioners at a time when the victim was six years old. The fact that the victim was more than 37 years of age at the time of making the complaint appears from the complaint itself.

8.

The transcript of a phone conversation has also been relied upon in the charge sheet which reveals innocuous content in the form of the second petitioner asking the victim to visit his house. It is difficult to locate the phone conversation on a timeline since the charge sheet does not give any further particulars as to when the conversation was recorded. The charge sheet merely records that one of the petitioners

(Laxmanan) called the victim to his house to have a talk on some issues. The charge sheet further indicates that medical examination is not possible since the alleged incident took place 25-30 years ago.

9.

The order impugned simply refers to the evidence of the victim and concludes that the accused may be prosecuted on that basis alone. The object of the law as it stands is to give predominance to the evidence of a victim for the purpose of protecting the sanctity of the evidence where obtaining any other corroborative evidence would be difficult. This, however, cannot be used to pin down persons on the sole basis of the testimony of a victim where the evidence lacks credibility and is not backed by corroborative evidence for proving the offence after a gap of 30 years. The evidence of a victim which is to be used for prosecuting persons guilty of sexual assault must at least be contemporaneous with the alleged occurrence so as to give the accused a chance to rebut the evidence. 10.

In the present case, the learned Judge has arrived at a conclusive finding merely on the strength of the victim's evidence. On a careful reading, the evidence appears to be random, confused and disjointed. The fact that the alleged assault took more than 30 years before the complaint cannot be used in favour of the victim and against the petitioners.

11.

CRR/18/2022 is accordingly allowed and disposed of by quashing the impugned order dated 10.06.2022.

The respondents are restrained from proceeding any further with Sessions Case No. 09 of 2021. The judgment is to be communicated to the learned Court and the respondents including the victim as expeditiously as possible. 12.

Urgent certificate copies of this judgement, if applied for, may be supplied to the parties upon compliance of usual formalities.

( Moushumi Bhattacharya , J.)