STATE OF U P Vs. SANTOSH SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) NONE appears on behalf of the complainant in Criminal Appeal No. 166 of 2011. We have heard Sri D. I. Faridi the learned A.G.A in support of the present government appeal no. 2072 of 2011. The case was that P.W.-3 was taken or enticed away by accused-respondents with an intent that she be subjected to forcible sexual intercourse. It appears that the police also sent up the case for trial under Sections 366, 363 and 376 I.P.C. but on consideration of the evidence of P.W.-3, discussed in paragraph 10 of the impugned judgement, we find that the whole air of the prosecution case goes out of its sail because the victim has stated that she had fallen in love for the boy, namely, Santosh Singh who often used to visit her in her sweetmeat shop and used to hold out to get promise that the boy shall marry her. The victim stated that she became ready for marrying the boy and, accordingly, she proposed to Santosh that he should take her to Bombay after marrying her and keep her as his wife and, accordingly, Santosh took her away. She stated that he never gave any allurement or blnadishment for being taken away. We further find from the evidence of P.W.-4 discussed in paragraph 12 of the judgment that while assessing the age of the victim, P.W.-3, the doctor, found her aged around 17 years, we remind ourselves that in such a case even if she do not add up three years to the assessed age and go by the verdict of S. Varadarajan Vs. State of Madras reported in A.I.R. 1965 SC 942. P.W.-3, he could be said to be at the verge of majority and what was pointed out by the Supreme Court in Paragraph 5 of the judgement on between taking away or enticing away on the one hand and a case of voluntarily eloping with the boy then we have to say that it was out and out a frivolous prosecution and a mindless appeal which has been preferred by the State of U.P.

(2.) WE must note that a court has to add up three year to the assessed age as the adding of that particular number of years to the assessed age shall be in the interest of the accused as per settled principles of law and above all, as per A.I.R. 1982 SC 1297 Jaya Mala Vs. Home Secretary, Government of Jammu and Kashmir. We were thinking of imposing some cost upon the State of U.P., but we again dropped the idea considering that the observation which we have made herein shall be sending the proper note of caution to the official of law department of the State of U.P. to buckle their belt up in cases of the present nature in presenting appeal before this court as ultimately this court always has the those officers its administrative control which is exercised by the court under Article 223 of the Constitution of India. With the above observations, we dismiss the application seeking leave of the court to appeal as also the present appeal. For the similar reasons, we also dismiss the complainant's Criminal Appeal No. 166 of 2011.