The Delhi High Court on Wednesday rejected a petition filed by the Unnao rape survivor seeking additional evidence to determine her age through school records, ruling that the case should be decided on the basis of evidence already on record.
A bench of Justices Prathibha M Singh and Justice Madhu Jain was hearing the survivor’s application who sought permission from the court to continue cross-examining two witnesses from the Uttar Pradesh school where she studied, including its principal Arun Kumar Singh and assistant teacher Virender Singh.
The court said that a letter from the survivor’s school clearly stated that no documents, including a birth certificate, had been submitted at the time of her admission, as such documents were not required under prevailing practice.
It further noted that the principal of the school attended and testified before the court of first instance, and an admission record was prepared. In these circumstances, the court considered that there was no need to request additional evidence at the appeal stage.
“The application is dismissed. The matter will be heard on the basis of the evidence on record,” the court said in its order.
The application was preferred in expelled BJP leader Kuldeep Singh Sengar’s appeal against a trial court’s December 2019 order convicting him of raping a girl (then a minor) in Unnao and sentencing him to imprisonment for the rest of his life.
A Supreme Court bench of Justices Subramonium Prasad and Harish Vaidyanathan Shankar on December 23 stayed Sengar’s life sentence while awaiting his appeal, concluding that he had already served seven years and five months in prison.
In its ruling, the court held that Sengar was convicted under Section 5(c) (penetrative sexual assault by a public servant) of the BOXO Act, but that the elected representative did not fit the definition of “public servant” under Section 21 of the IPC.
But on December 29, the Supreme Court stayed the apex court’s order, saying that fundamental legal issues had been raised in the matter and required consideration.
In her application before the Delhi High Court, argued by advocate Mehmood Pracha and Sanwar Chaudhary, the survivor alleged that Sengar influenced the investigation to prevent the Investigating Officer (IO) from correctly determining her age by obtaining relevant records from Akhbar Bahadur Singh Public School in Unnao.
She said the investigating officer, at Sengar’s request, instead examined one of his accomplices, who was later presented as a defense witness, and who falsely claimed to have studied at a government school in Khandesarai.
The former BJP leader is also serving a 10-year prison sentence in connection with the death of the rape survivor’s father, who died on April 9, 2018.
