SUBHASH Vs. THE STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BEING aggrieved by the Judgment and Order dated 09th March, 2015 passed by learned Additional Sessions Judge, Chandrapur, in Sessions Case No. 2 of 2013 convicting the appellant Subhash Balkrushna Buradkar of the offences under Sections 9 and 10 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012, and sentencing him to undergo Rigorous Imprisonment for five years and to pay a fine of Rs. 2,000/ -, in default, further Rigorous Imprisonment for one month, and also for the offence under Section 354 -A of Indian Penal Code, the present appeal has been filed by the appellant, who is in jail from 5th July, 2013.

(2.) IN support of the appeal, learned counsel for the appellant submitted that the prosecution case is based on the solitary testimony of the girl child witness aged about nine years, and the Trial Court recorded conviction on the basis of the said evidence. He submitted that though the conviction can be based on the sole testimony of a witness, but then, in that case, the evidence of such a witness should be trustworthy and without any infirmity. He then submitted that in the instant case, the child witness 'V' [PW 1] admitted in the cross -examination that her police statement was recorded during investigation, as told by her grand -mother to the police. He also submitted that she was taught by her grand -mother how to give evidence in the Court and that the statement by police was recorded in Hindi on the questions put to her in Hindi. He then submitted that there are inherent contradictions in the evidence of the child witness. That apart, there is a serious doubt about the identity of the appellant -accused, since the child witness did not say a word about she knowing the accused previously or she identifying the accused in the Test Identification Parade. In fact, not a single question was asked by the prosecution as to identification of the accused by her in the Test Identification Parade. He then submitted that in para 6 of the cross -examination, she changed the entire story of the prosecution; but surprisingly enough, the Trial Judge has not chosen to refer to or look into the cross -examination at all and decided to convict the appellant, stating therein that the accused did not deny the material portion in her Examination -in -Chief. According to Mr. Joshi, the initial burden of proof being on the prosecution, the entire story is wrongly gathered, marshaled and assessed by the Court, and even assuming that the suggestions or denials are not given, the entire cross -examination shows that the accused never admitted the offence to have been committed by him, and, on the contrary, the story is about his false implication, which necessarily means that he has denied the story of prosecution. He then submitted that the Trial Judge went by the principle that no family member or the guardians of the girl would put her to the risk of dis -reputation by making any false allegations. To substantiate his argument, learned Adv. Mr. Joshi relied on the following decisions: -

(3.) I have perused the entire evidence with the assistance of the learned counsel for the rival parties carefully. I have seen the reasons recorded by the Trial Judge in the judgment impugned.