Railway employee gets 10 yrs in jail for minor’s rape

Srinagar, Jun 8: A Sessions court here on Monday awarded a railway employee ten years of rigorous imprisonment in a case related to kidnaping, wrongful confinement and raping of a minor girl at his official residential quarters in Hamray in Baramulla district in 2012.

The Court of Additional Sessions Judge Srinagar, Farooq Ahmad Bhat, sentenced Imtiyaz Ahmad Rather of Gotapora, Budgam, after convicting him under sections 363 (kidnapping), 376 (rape) and 342 (wrongful confinement) of the Ranbir Penal Code of (RPC).

Rather is presently employed with the Railways at Hamray in north Kashmir’s Pattan.

In its decision, the court underscored that the aggravating circumstances outweighed the mitigating factors, particularly because the victim was a minor and the convict had misused government accommodation allotted to him for the commission of the offence.

The prosecution contention was that the victim, then a student of Class IX and below 14 years of age, was lured by the accused on the false promise of marriage. He allegedly took the minor girl to his government residential quarter at Hamray Railway Station in Pattan, where he confined her and repeatedly subjected her to sexual assault.

In July 2012, the victim approached the authorities with a complaint, following which an FIR (01/2012) was registered at Police Station Railway Hamray. The investigators carried out searches of the accused’s residential quarter, prepared site plans, seized material evidence, recorded witness statements and obtained medical and forensic reports.

The victim’s statement was also recorded under Section 164 of CrPC before a magistrate.

In August 2012, the charge sheet was initially committed to the Sessions Court at Baramulla. Subsequently, in response to the complainant’s petition, the High Court transferred the case to Srinagar court in February 2014.

During arguments on sentence, the prosecution sought life imprisonment, contending that the accused had shown no mercy towards a helpless minor girl and had exploited his official position and accommodation to commit the crime.

However, the defence pleaded for leniency, citing the convict’s family responsibilities, absence of any previous criminal record and the hardship his incarceration would cause to his dependents.

The court rejected the argument for a lighter sentence, holding that the prosecution had established the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable doubt through clear and cogent evidence.

The court sentenced the convict to ten years’ rigorous imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 1 lakh for the offence under Section 376 of RPC.

For the offence under Section 363 of RPC, the court awarded the convict five years’ rigorous imprisonment and fined Rs 50,000. Besides, he was sentenced to one year’s rigorous imprisonment under Section 342 of RPC.

All substantive sentences, the court said, would run concurrently and ordered that the period already spent in custody during investigation and trial be set off against the sentence in accordance with law.