JUDGMENT

Arijit Pasayat, J.-Taking lift on a bicycle after a late night movie show and travelling in darkness can result in some harrowing traumas for a teenaged girl, as the victim in the present case experienced.

2. Accused-appellant Koppula Venkat Rao calls in question legality of his conviction as recorded by the Trial Court and upheld by Learned Single Judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (in short the IPC ). He was sentenced to undergo 10 years RI by the Trial Court which was reduced to 5 years by the High Court.

3. Accusations which led to the trial of the accused are essentially as follows:

On 10.6.1991, at about 6.00 p.m. the victim along with her friend and two others started by walk from their village to go to a nearby place for witnessing a movie. They reached cross-roads of the village where the accused along with his friends who were going to Borrampalem on their bicycles met them and gave lift to the victim girl and her friends and all of them witnessed the picture at a movie hall. At the time of return accused nourished an idea of quenching his lust by committing sexual intercourse with the victim, invited her to board