Rape victim's statement is not always the truth: Supreme Court

In a major change from its previous judgments that a rape victim’s testimony is enough to hold an accused guilty, the Supreme Court has now held that the testimony can’t be considered to be the gospel truth.

“In a matter of rape, the victim’s statement must be given primary consideration. But, the broad principle that the prosecution has to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt applies equally to a case of rape… there can be no presumption that a victim would always tell the entire story truthfully,” a bench of  justices HS Bedi and JM Panchal said in a recent judgment.

The bench said this while acquitting Abbas Ahmad Chowdhary, who had been convicted by a trial court in Assam and the high court (HC), for raping a minor girl on September 15, 1997.

Giving the benefit of doubt to Chowdhary, the judges found gross
variations in the victim’s statements. In a statement recorded on September 17, 1997, she had not attributed any rape to Chowdhary.

She had said he was not one of the accused who kidnapped and took her to Jalalpur Tea Estate. She said she was returning to her village along with one Ranju Das when Chowdhary joined them on the way. She never mentioned the word rape.

Some corroboration of rape could have been found if Chowdhary too had been apprehended and taken to the police station, the bench noted.

The victim’s original statement was corroborated by the investigating officers. Only two of the accused — Ranju Das and Mohammed Mizalul Haq — were brought to the police station along with the victim.

“An inference can be rightly drawn that Chowdhary was perhaps not in the car when the victim and the two accused had been apprehended by constable Ranjit Dutta,” the bench said while closely screening the evidence. “The involvement of Chowdhary is doubtful,” the SC said and upheld the conviction of Haq.

Though there has been outcry against the increasing cases of sexual crimes against vulnerable women and concerns have been expressed that the accused must not be let off, in November last year the Supreme Court passed another controversial acquittal order saying the victim was a “woman of easy virtues”.

“The victim appears to be a lady used to sexual intercourse and a dissolute lady. She had no objection in mixing up and having free movement with any of her known person, for enjoyment,” a bench of justices Mukundakam Sharma and BS Chauhan held while quashing a Guwahati HC judgment that had upheld the conviction of accused Musauddin Ahmed alias Musa.