Mumbai, Mar 27 (PTI) A special court here has sentenced a retired police constable to imprisonment of five years for molesting a 13-year-old girl while on duty at a hospital in suburban Mulund in 2017.
The 58-year-old accused was convicted under IPC section 354 (A) (molestation) and relevant provisions of the POCSO Act by special judge Kalpana Patil on March 22.
The detailed order became available on Wednesday. The accused constable was, however, acquitted for an offence committed under IPC (Indian Penal Code) section 506 for criminal intimidation.
Relying on the testimony of the victim and other evidence, the court concluded that the prosecution had successfully proved the charge against the accused for molestation.
The court stated that for the charges under IPC section 506, the prosecution has to prove that the accused threatened the victim girl with injury to her reputation or property or to the person.
From the statement of the victim girl it does not appear that there was a particular threat given by the accused which will cause alarm to the victim girl, it noted.
The girl had accompanied her mother to a hospital in Mulund who was injured during a quarrel with their neighbour that occurred on the night of October 19, 2017.
The woman, in her testimony, claimed after she was given first aid and medicine, it was too late in the night, so she and her daughter were waiting at the hospital when she spotted ‘Police Kaksha’ (police booth).
The woman approached the cop present there and narrated the incident of the quarrel with her neighbour and asked him whether she would get any help, as per the prosecution.
However, she was told to visit Bhandup police station. The woman then asked the constable whether she could sit in the police booth for some time with her minor daughter, a class 9 student, as it was late at night.
When the woman went to attend the nature’s call, the constable allegedly touched the girl inappropriately, the prosecution said.
The victim started crying when she and her mother left the hospital on October 20 morning. She narrated her ordeal to her mother and told her that the constable had also threatened her not to disclose the incident, the prosecution said.
The mother returned to the hospital and reported the incident to the medical officer who called the police and the case was registered against the accused Sharad Hande, who was posted at the booth. Hande was arrested from the hospital immediately.
The court relied on the testimony of the victim, and her mother, which was corroborated by doctors, a watchman of the hospital and other witnesses who saw the duo in the hospital and also in CCTV footage. PTI AVI NSK
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