'Act Was Brutal But Not Committed With Brutality': Madhya Pradesh High Court Commutes Death Penalty In Child Rape Case

The Madhya Pradesh High Court, on Thursday (June 19), commuted death penalty of a 20 year old man belonging to a scheduled tribe convicted of raping a 4 year old child. The trial court had granted capital punishment, noting that the child was left permanently disabled. The high court, while acknowledging the gravity of the offence, held that although the act was undeniably brutal, it was not executed with brutality. The bench, while commuting the sentence to life imprisonment, took into consideration certain mitigating factors such as the convict's history, his lack of education and tribal background. The division bench of Justice Vivek Agarwal and Justice Devnarayan Mishra observed, "No doubt that appellant's act was brutal as he has committed rape upon the victim of four years and three months of age and after committing rape also throttled her treating her dead and thrown the victim in such a place where she could not be searched and left the spot but it is also clear that he has not committed brutality". According to the prosecution, the convict entered the complainant's hut and requested a cot to sleep on. Later that night, he allegedly opened the gate of a nearby house where the victim and her parents was staying, abducted her, and raped her. Thereafter, he allegedly left the child in an unconscious state in a mango orchard, believing her to be dead. At the time of the incident, the victim was 4 years and 3 months old, while the appellant was 20 years old. The trial court granted the death penalty to the convict. Aggrieved, he approached the high court challenging the conviction order. Advocate Samar Singh Rajpoot, representing the convict, argued that the victim and the alleged incriminating material were recovered from an open area, raising doubts about the reliability of the recovery. It was also contended that the case was based solely on circumstantial evidence and lacked any eyewitness testimony.Advocate Rajpoot further emphasized that there was no evidence of the victim suffering permanent disability or grievous injury as a result of the incident. It was alleged that the evidence was fabricated post-arrest and maintained that, given the convict's young age, clean antecedents, and socio-economic background—being an illiterate member of the Scheduled Tribe (S.T.) community—capital punishment was unwarranted. Deputy Advocate General Yash Soni, representing the State, strongly opposed the appeal, contending that the prosecution had established the convict's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. It was further submitted that since the victim was a 4-year-old child who was left to die in an orchard, no leniency ought to be extended to the convict. Thus, the court held that the convict did commit the offence of rape and sustained his guilt under Sections 450, 363, 376 (a), 376AB, 307 and Section 201 of the Indian Penal Code and Sections 5 and 6 of the POCSO Act. With regard to the confirmation of the death sentence, the trial court observed that the offence had rendered the victim permanently disabled. However, the high court disagreed with this presumption, noting the lack of medical evidence to conclusively establish that the permanent disability was caused by the incident. The high court further noted that the trial court relied solely on the testimony of Dr Rakesh Shukla, but observed that the doctor did not clearly specify which part of the body was damaged or whether the injury was of such nature as to cause lifelong disability. Therefore, the high court set aside this finding of the trial court. The high court acknowledged that the aggravating circumstance of this case was the age of the victim and the convict. The bench stated, "There are aggravating circumstances that the victim was four year old and the rape was committed upon such a kid and offence was committed in such a way that the private part of the victim was torn and after committing the offence, the victim was thrown in the solitary place treating her that she had died".However, the bench also acknowledged the mitigating factors of the case, including the convict's background. The court noted that "the appellant is youth of tribal community aged about 20 years. There is no adverse comment regarding his conduct. There is no report that he has previously committed any such type of offence and as per the statement of his mother, he left the parental house at the very early age and was working in the Dhaba and earning his bread. He is not properly educated". Citing the case of Bhaggi v State of Madhya Pradesh [(2024) 5 SCC 782], the court distinguished between an act of rape being both barbaric and brutal and one being barbaric but not necessarily brutal. The bench noted that the current case was barbaric but not brutal. Referring to the cases of Manoharan v. State [(2019) 7 SCC 716] and Dhananjoy Chatterjee v. State of West Bengal [(1994) 2 SCC 2020], the bench observed that the act of the convict was brutal, but it was not committed with...

'Act Was Brutal But Not Committed With Brutality': Madhya Pradesh High Court Commutes Death Penalty In Child Rape Case

Jayanti Pahwa

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