Expelled BJP MLA Sengar convicted in Unnao rape case

The court convicted Sengar for rape under the Indian Penal Code and the Pocso Act for offence by a public servant committing penetrative sexual assault against a child. The court will hear arguments on quantum on sentence on Wednesday. The offences entail maximum punishment of life imprisonment.

District Judge Dharmesh Sharma, however, acquitted co-accused Shashi Singh of all charges. Convicting Sengar, 53, under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, the court said the CBI proved that the victim was a minor and he was rightly prosecuted under the special law.

“I found her statement truthful and unblemished that she was sexually assaulted. She was under threat, worried. She is a village girl, not from cosmopolitan educated area... Sengar was powerful person. So she took her time,” the judge said while reading outthe verdict.

When the judge started pronouncing the verdict, co-accused Singh fainted. The court noted that after the victim wrote letter to the UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, several criminal cases were filed against her family and ‘imprints of Sengar’ were visible in them.

The court expressed surprise over the delay by the CBI in filing charge sheet in the rape case and said it prolonged trial against Sengar and others.

The court pulled up the CBI for delay in filing the charge as also the absence of women officer in conducting the probe “without bothering for the kind of harassment, anguish and re-victimisation that occurs for a victim of sexual assault”. It also expressed displeasure over the agency leaking selectively the vital information relating to the statement of the survivor to put a cloud over her case. It said that the CBI itself was not following the manual relating to investigation and prosecution. More on P10