UDUPI: The fast track special court – 1 (POCSO court) sentenced a person found guilty of sexually abusing his teenage daughters to serve the remainder of his natural life in prison, here on Monday. This is the first such instance of a person accused under section 6 of the POCSO Act being handed out the maximum punishment in the district as per an amendment in 2019 that the union government made to the legislation to serve as a deterrent.
FTSC court judge Yadav Vanamala Anandrao who found the accused guilty under section 376 of IPC and section 6, its equivalent in POCSO Act, ruled that the accused will have to pay a fine of Rs 15,000. Finding the person guilty under section 10 of the Act, the judge directed him to pay a fine of Rs 5,000 and an equivalent amount for charges under section 506 of IPC. Both sections warranted the accused to undergo 7 years rigorous imprisonment.
Y T Raghavendra, special public prosecutor, FTSC-1 said the court directed the accused to undergo 1-year imprisonment if he defaulted in paying the fine. However, the sentence under section 10 and 506 IPC is largely infructuous given that the court has already directed him to be in judicial custody for the rest of his natural life. Hitherto, the courts directed a person found guilty under sections 6/376 IPC to undergo a maximum of 20-years RI, he said.
In addition, the court also directed the state to pay a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to the elder of the two teenage daughters of the accused, whom he sexually assaulted and Rs 1.5-lakh to the younger one whom he molested under the victim compensation scheme. The district legal services authority will hand over this amount to the victims, who presently are in state care, at a later date through the department of women and child welfare, he said.
The above case was registered in Hebri police station following a complaint that the child protection unit (CPU) received based on information that an anganwadi teacher gave the CPU officer Prabhakar Acharya on October 1, 2019. Then Circle Police Inspectors Mahesh Prasad and Sampath Kumar had registered the complaint and investigated the case. The court heard the testimony of eight of the 26 witnesses listed by the prosecution.