Delhi HC upholds man's 5-yr jail term for sexually assaulting minor niece

The Delhi High Court on Monday upheld the five-year imprisonment awarded to a man for repeatedly sexually assaulting his 10-year-old niece and rejected his contention that the minor had conceived a devious plan to implicate him.

Justice Vibhu Bakhru said the court found no room for doubt that the man had sexually assaulted the child and dismissed his appeal against his conviction and sentence awarded by the trial court in May 2017.

"...the testimony of the child is quite clear and there is no doubt that the appellant (man) had sexually assaulted the child. The contention that the child had implicated the appellant because he used to scold her is unpersuasive.

"The child has clearly described the sexual assault committed on her and this court is unable to accept that the child of such tender years could have conceived of a devious plan for making such bile allegations to implicate a close relative only because he would scold her and compel her to do her schoolwork," the judge said.

According to the prosecution, the girl's father, after her mother's death, left her with her paternal aunt and her husband.

In November 2014, police received information about an abandoned girl in a bus. The child told the officials that she ran away from her aunt's house as her uncle used to repeatedly sexually assault her.

The minor was medically examined and a case was registered against her uncle.

During the trial, the man had pleaded innocence and claimed that the girl levelled the allegations against him as he and his wife used to scold her for not doing school homework.

The high court, however, said there was merit in the man's contention that the inference drawn by the trial court on the basis of a sketch drawn by the child was unwarranted.

Noting that the child had drawn a house, a girl carrying balloons and a girl's dress, it said, "This did not, in any manner, indicate that the child had an intermingled relation, or any inference of commission of a sexual assault could be drawn by the said sketch."