SHASHIKANT BAJIRAO PAGARE Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner, hereinafter referred to as "the accused" has been convicted by the learned Sessions Judge of Nasik in Sessions Case No. 76 of 1981 for offences punishable under sections 366 and 376 of the Indian Penal Code. He has also been convicted for the offence punishable under section 363 of the Indian Penal Code, though no separate sentence was awarded for the same. Technically, this order of conviction under section 363 of the Indian Penal Code is incorrect because the offence under section 366 is a larger one embracing the offence under section 363. Along with the accused another person named Sulbha was also put up for trial for offences punishable under the same sections, but read with section 34. She has, however, been acquitted. The order of the learned Sessions Judge convicting the accused and acquitting the other accused, Sulbha is of 23rd of October, 1981.

(2.) . Aggrieved by the said order of conviction, the accused has preferred Criminal Revision Application No. 780 of 1981 because the sentence awarded by the learned Sessions Judge is not appealable. This Court has issued a notice of enhancement, which is being treated as Criminal Revision Application No. 350 of 1982.

(3.) The facts leading to the prosecution have been set out in sufficient details in the judgment of the Court below and it is not necessary for me to refer to the same. However, the prosecution case may be briefly stated. The accused and the prosecutrix, a girl called Namrata, were taking private tutions in a coaching class known as Yeshwant Classes. They came in close contact with each other and, according to the prosecution, the accused promised to marry the prosecutrix, as a result of which she was induced to leave her parental house an 16th of March, 1979. Therefore both the accused and the prosecutrix, says the prosecution, stayed in a house at Nasik, which seems to have been used as a lodging house, and the accused has sexual intercourse with her in that house. Thereafter both the accused and the prosecutrix made their way to Bombay where they stayed with the maternal uncle of the accused upto 23rd of March, 1979. The evidence discloses that on that day the parents of the accused came to Bombay and both the accused and the prosecutrix returned to Nasik, where the accused was put under arrest and later prosecuted for the offences as mentioned above.