PUNE: A sessions court convicted and sentenced an application development team leader (41) with a prominent IT company in Hinjewadi to 25 years of rigorous imprisonment for repeatedly raping his 12-year-old niece over a period of three years before May 11, 2021.The minor rape survivor was living with her maternal aunt and the latter’s husband, the convict, after her father murdered her mother. Her father is in jail.Special Judge HM Bhosale on April 8 found the IT engineer guilty of offenses under sections 5 (I) (n) and 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act, which relate to aggravated penetrative sexual assault by a person in a position of authority or a family member. The crime attracts a minimum sentence of 20 years that may be extended up to life in jail till death or a death sentence.The Hinjewadi police had invoked gang rape, among other charges, as the survivor alleged that the minor brother of her maternal aunt, who is the complainant, had spotted the convict while sexually exploiting her. He allegedly took advantage of the same to rape her on two to three occasions.The court dismissed the gang rape charge, holding that the prosecution’s case was not that “the accused (IT engineer) and the boy sexually exploited the survivor in furtherance of a common intention to commit gang rape”. The allegations against the minor boy are related to a separate incident, the judge noted and directed the investigating officer “to take steps to arrest the absconded accused and further necessary steps to prosecute him either before the Juvenile Board or Children’s Court, as per his age at the time of committing this crime”.According to the case put up by special prosecutor Arundhati Brahme, the incident came to light on May 10, 2021, when the wife of the accused, on suspicion about his activities, had placed her cellphone camera with video on in the room where the rape occurred. On her return, she found that the entire act was recorded and immediately referred the girl to medical examination and lodged a complaint on May 11, 2021. The IT engineer was arrested the same day and has been in jail since then.Incidentally, the complainant did not support the rape allegation during the trial and had to be declared hostile. The video evidence, which she admitted to having recorded, the “confidence inspiring and reliable” testimony by the rape survivor, which was further supported by medical and DNA evidence and Chemical Analysis expert evidence, nailed the accused (IT engineer), resulting in the conviction.The court held that the convict did not deserve any leniency in punishment. “The act of rape committed in the present case, as reflects from the video (of the incident), is so heinous and reprehensible that it shocks the conscience of the common man. Such a barbaric act strikes at the very core of societal values. The trauma suffered by the victim-P (survivor) is immeasurable and left a lasting scar on her psyche. The act has caused irreparable harm to the physical, mental and emotional well being of the victim-P. The innocence of the victim-P has been brutally violated. The accused (IT engineer) has exploited the vulnerability and helplessness of a minor child,” the judge noted.
