Crime Today News
The Supreme Court on Tuesday said that judges must be careful when making observations in cases related to sexual violence against women, Bar and Bench reported.
A bench of Justices BR Gavai and Augustine George Masih made the remarks about an Allahabad High Court order on March 11 granting bail to a man accused of raping a woman in 2024. Justice Sanjay Kumar Singh of the High Court had said that the woman had “invited trouble” for herself and was responsible for the crime committed against her.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court said that unwarranted observations against the complainant should be avoided even while the grant of bail was the discretion of the judge depending on the facts of each case, according to Bar and Bench.
“There is another order now by another judge,” Bar and Bench quoted Gavai as saying. “Yes, bail can be granted. But what is this discussion that ‘she herself invited trouble etc’? One has to be careful when saying such things especially on this side [judges].”
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta also noted that “complete justice should not only be done but also seen to be done”, Bar and Bench reported. “How a common person perceives such orders will also have to be seen,” Mehta said.
The Supreme Court was hearing a suo motu case initiated by it on another Allahabad High Court order, which had said that acts of grabbing a child’s breasts, breaking the string of her pyjama and attempting to drag her beneath a culvert did not constitute the offence of attempt to rape or rape.
The observations under scrutiny were made by High Court Justice Ram Manohar Narayan Mishra on March 17 while altering charges against two men accused of attempting to rape a 11-year-old girl in 2021.
The two men were originally summoned by a court in Uttar Pradesh’s Kasganj district to stand trial under charges of rape under the Indian Penal Code and attempted rape under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. They had challenged the summons arguing that even if the complaint was taken at face value, it did not constitute an offence of attempt to rape.
The High Court had directed them to be tried for assault with intent to disrobe under the Indian Penal Code, which carries a lesser punishment, and aggravated sexual assault under the POCSO Act.
The Supreme Court on March 26 stayed the High Court order. The bench had taken suo motu cognisance of the matter a day after another bench of Justices Bela Trivedi and Prasanna B Varale dismissed a public interest litigation petition filed against the High Court order.
The Supreme Court had said that the High Court’s observations were “shocking”.
At the hearing on Tuesday, the Supreme Court deferred the hearing in the matter by a month.
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