Ujjain (Madhya Pradesh): A special court has sentenced a 21-year-old man to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment for raping a minor in Madhya Pradesh's Ujjain district.
The Special POCSO court on Monday awarded the sentence to Rahul Fularia on the basis of DNA tests after the 15-year-old victim did not cooperate with the prosecution.
Additional Sessions Judge Dr Aarti Shukla Pandey said "The courts should not only notice the rights of the accused, but the interest of the victim and the society at large." A balance should be struck between the seriousness of the crime and the punishment. Inadequate punishment will hugely harm the victim and the society, the judge said, while handing down 20 years RI to the convict and imposing a fine of Rs 3,000 on him.
On January 6, 2020, the victim's mother lodged a complaint with the police stating that the girl had gone missing while she had gone to drop her grandson at school, prosecution deputy director Saket Vyas said.
Following a probe, the police zeroed in on the accused, a resident of Shajapur. The victim during the course of trial backtracked from her statement to the police against the accused and did not cooperate, the prosecution said.
A DNA test was conducted on both the victim and the accused, and it was proven that the girl was a minor.
The accused was convicted of offences under section 376 (3) and other relevant provisions of the IPC and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, it was stated.
