GARAB SINGH GOND Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE appellant Garab Singh Gond is the mukoddam of the rayotwari village of Keria Dmri in the Betul District. His servant Sadu Gond, who was tried and convicted along with him, has also appealed (criminal appeal No. 14 of 1927) and both appeals will be governed by this judgment. The facts on which the two convictions are based are very clearly established by the evidence, and indeed the denials of some of them by the accused can hardly be taken seriously. They are as follows: Garab Singh desired Phula Gondin of the neighbouring village of Chhatarpur as his second wife. She lived with her widowed mother Gengri (P. W. 6) and her father's brother Manju (P. W. 7). In November 1926 Phula was thirteen years and seven months old, but the Civil Surgeon (P. W. 4), who examined her in connexion with this case, found that " the hymen had been ruptured long ago " and said: The parts were so wall developed that I think that the girl is used to sexual intercourse.

(2.) DURING the afternoon of the 9th of November the two accused went to Manju's field, where Phula was alone, cutting the kutki crop, and carried her off by force to a field of Garab Singh She struggled to escape, but was induced to keep quiet by no very gentle treatment. The two men compelled the girl to stay all night in the field with them, and during the night Garab Singh had sexual intercourse with her three times against her will. Early the next morning he returned home leaving Sadu in charge of the girl with instructions not to let her go away, and as additional security the silver bracelets (bankra) she was wearing were removed and Garab Singh took them away with him. During the forenoon a search-party came upon Sadu and Phula Sadu fled and Phula was taken home. The object of the two accused was to compel Phula to marry Garab Singh.

(3.) IN describing the eight forms of marriage among Hindus, of which the first four only are approved, Manu says of the seventh: The seizure of a maiden by force from her house, while she weeps and calls for assistance, after her kinsmen and friends who have been slain in battle or wounded, and their houses broken open, is the marriage styled rakshasa.