MUTHU Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Appellant is before the court in this appeal, challenging the judgment of conviction dtd. 30/3/2022 and order on sentence dtd. 31/3/2022, passed in Special CC No.546 of 2015 by the Additional City Civil and Sessions Judge-FTSC-II, Bengaluru (for short "the trial Court").

(2.) For the sake of convenience, the parties herein are referred to as per their status and rank before the trial court.

(3.) Brief facts leading to this appeal are that Police Inspector of HAL Police Station, filed charge sheet against the accused for the offences punishable under Ss. 376 and 506 of Indian Penal Code and Sec. 6 of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (for short "the POCSO Act"). It is alleged by the prosecution that CW1 is the wife of CW3 and the victim minor girl who is aged 8 years and studying in 2nd standard, is the daughter of CW1 and CW3. The said family is residing in the house No.26, Munibachappa Colony, Jagadish Nagar, HAL. The house of the accused is situated opposite to the house of CW1. On 2/9/2015, the Government had declared a holiday on account of Bharat Bandh. The victim was in her house on that day. At about 2.00 pm when the victim minor girl was playing in front of her house, the accused took her to the house, closed the main door and forcibly had physical contact with the minor girl without her consent, and he also asked her not to disclose the said fact to anybody and posed a life threat to the victim minor girl. Thus, the accused committed the alleged offences. After filing charge-sheet, case was registered in Special CC No.546 of 2015. Accused was enlarged on bail.