D. S. ZOTING, J. :- This is an appeal preferred by the original accused against the judgment and order of conviction and sentence dated 30-01-2002 passed by the Special Judge, Gadchiroli in Special Case No.2 of 2000 whereby the appellant (hereinafter referred to as the "accused") has been convicted and sentenced for offence under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code to undergo imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs.5,000/-, in default, to suffer further rigorous imprisonment for two years.

2. The facts which are not in dispute may be briefly stated as under:

Accused Motiram Govindrao Kamdi was working as Head-master of the Government Post Basic Ashram School, Bhakrondi, Tahsil Armori, District Gadchiroli. Prabhakar Ganesh Mane (P.WA) was working as Head-master of the Secondary Ashram School at Bhakrondi.

Prosecutrix was student of 8th standard in the said Ashram School. She was admitted in the hostel run by the Ashram School. Hostel and the Ashram School are situated in the same premises. P. W.II Jijabai is the mother of prosecutrix. Jijabai has three daughters.

Prosecutrix (P.W.1) is the second daughter of Jijabai. Shewanta is the eldest and Vanita is the youngest daughter of Jijabai. Jijabai is resident of Bhansi. The distance between village Bhakrondi and village Bhansi is about 4 kms. These are the facts which are not in dispute.

3. The prosecution case arises out of the First Information Report 30-03-2000 lodged by Jijabai (P.W.11). The prosecution story as revealed in the FIR may be stated in brief is as under.

Before 3-4 days of the report, one teacher of the Ashram School visited her house and informed her that her daughter is not attending the School and she was directed to bring her daughter to the school at about 04.00 p.m. When Jijabai enquired with her daughter as to why she is not attending the school, she told her that students tease her as "Kamdi Master" and she started weeping. On further query made by Jijabai, she told her that while she was student of 6th standard, the accused used to call her to his house for doing house-hold work whenever his wife was not in the house and he committed rape on her during the period of two years. The complainant further alleged that her daughter told her that she had not disclosed this fact to anybody as the accused had threatened that she would be defamed. It is also alleged that the accused promised to perform marriage with her.

For this reason also, she had not disclosed this fact to anybody. On 01-03-2000 the accused had sexual intercourse with her against her will and, therefore, she raised shouts. Her friends heard the said shouts and they saw her and the accused in the said house. Again on 07-03-2000 some students peeped from the window when the accused was forcing her to have sexual intercourse with her and since then students started teasing her in the namy of Kamdi master.

The oral report lodged by Jijabai was reduced into writing. On the basis of this report, PSI Mankar (P.W.8) registered the crime against the accused. He visited the spot of incident and drew panchanama. He seized the clothes of the prosecutrix. He obtained Birth Register from the Head-master of the School which revealed that prosecutrix's date of birth was 27-02-1985.

The accused was arrested. His clothes were attached under seizure panchanama. The prosecutrix was referred to Medical Officer for examination. The Medical Officer referred her to the Radiologist for determination of her age. Radiologist opined that the age of the prosecutrix is between 15 and 16 years only. Accused was also referred to the Medical Officer for his medical examination. Seized articles along with vaginal swab of the prosecutrix and blood sample of the accused were sent to Chemical Analyser. Shri. Shewale, SDPO carried out further investigation. He recorded statements of witnesses and after completion of investigation, the accused was charge-sheeted for the offence under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 3(

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