The conviction of a father for aggravated penetrative sexual assault on his minor daughter was upheld, while the mother was acquitted of abetment but convicted for failing to report the crime.

JUDGMENT

(Prayers: Referred Trial under Section 366 Cr.P.C., on the judgment and order dated 29.04.2022 passed in Special S.C.No.52 of 2021 on the file of the learned Sessions Judge, Special Court for exclusive trial of cases under POCSO Act, Chennai. Criminal Appeal filed under Section 374(2) Cr.P.C. seeking to set aside the judgment of conviction and sentence dated 29.04.2022 passed in Special S.C.No.52 of 2021 on the file of the learned Sessions Judge, Special Court for exclusive trial of cases under POCSO Act, Chennai. Criminal Appeal filed under Section 374(2) Cr.P.C. seeking to set aside the judgment of conviction and sentence dated 29.04.2022 passed in Special S.C.No.52 of 2021 on the file of the learned Sessions Judge, Special Court for exclusive trial of cases under POCSO Act, Chennai.)

Common Judgment

SUNDER MOHAN, J.

1. For the sake of convenience, the parties are referred to as per their ranking before the trial Court. The victim for the sake of anonymity is referred to as 'victim'.

2. The brief facts leading to the institution of the Referred Trial and the Criminal Appeals, are as follows:

2.1. Case of the Prosecution:

It is the case of the prosecution that the accused are the father(A1) and mother (A2) of the victim-PW2; that the father-A1 had committed the offence of penetrative sexual assault on the minor daughter ever since she was 7 years old, till she attained her puberty at the age of 12; that A1 always insisted that the minor daughter should sleep next to him without dress and would remove her clothes, sexually abused her by squeezing her breast, putting his mouth on her breast, putting clips used for drying clothes on her vagina, penetrating his hands into her vagina, inserted small bottles and small pipes into her vagina; that after the victim attained 12 years A1 also abused the victim child by penetrating his penis into her mouth and thereby committed inappropriate sexual abuses to the victim child; that thereafter, committed penetrative sexual assault on several occasions; that the victim minor child informed the same to her mother-A2, who did not care to take any action on that; that due to repeated penetrative sexual assault, the victim child got pregnant once; that to abort the foetus, A1 kicked on her back and harassed her by punching on the pillow kept on her lower abdomen; that since there was no miscarriage even after that, both the accused gave a tablet to the minor child, to cause miscarriage; that the victim girl told her classmate about the sexual assaults made by her father-A1; that she in turn suggested to the victim girl, to inform their teacher-PW3; that the victim informed PW3; that PW3 informed the Child Helpline; that PW1 a member of the Child Helpline Group enquired the victim and lodged a complaint; and that thereafter, an FIR was registered in Cr.No.3 of 2020, against A1 for the offence punishable under Sections 354, 354B, 376 AB, 376(3), 506(i) of Indian Penal Code (hereinafter referred as IPC) and Section 5(j)(ii)(l)(m)(n) r/w 6 of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2019 (hereinafter referred as POCSO Act) and against A2 for the offence punishable under Sections 376 AB, 376(3) r/w 114 of IPC and 17 r/w 6 of POCSO Act.

2.2. The victim girl first informed about the alleged sexual assaults to her classmate and then to PW3, who was working as a teacher in a school, where the victim was studying. The victim along with her friend is said to have met PW3 on 03.02.2020 and told PW3 that the victim was not willing to go back to her house. When PW3 questioned the victim, as to why she refused to go to her house, she initially informed that her father-A1 had beaten her and showed her the injury marks; on further enquiry by PW3, the victim is said to have told PW3 about the sexual abuses committed by her father; and that her mother, initially questioned her father and thereafter, she did not do anything to save the minor child, due to her fath