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MUMBAI: After spending eight years in jail on charges of sexually assaulting a 17-year-old intellectually disabled girl, a 56-year-old driver was recently acquitted by a special Pocso court.The prosecution failed to prove the “basic foundational facts” of the case, highlighting major inconsistencies regarding the girl’s age, her mental capacity, and a significant contradiction between her statements and the medical report. “To my mind, evidence adduced by the prosecution is scanty and not sufficient to prove the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable doubt. If it were so, to my mind, the accused is entitled to get the benefit of doubt,” Special Judge ND Khose said.Advocates Kalam Shaikh and Vaishali Sawant, who defended the accused, submitted that he was falsely implicated due to a past conflict between the girl’s family and him.“No documentary evidence is placed on record showing that the victim is abnormal. Medical evidence is also not supporting the case of the prosecution,” the advocates submitted.The FIR was lodged on Aug 24, 2017. The prosecution alleged that the incident occurred on Aug 23, 2017, between 8 pm and 8.30pm in a slum area. Prosecution failed to prove girl was under age of 18: JudgeThe mother of the girl claimed that while she was at the market and her sons were out, the accused, a neighbour, entered their house. The girl, allegedly a child of 17 years with “less understanding”, later told her mother that the accused had kissed her and established physical relations.The judge noted that the prosecution failed to provide “clinching, believable and authentic documentary evidence” to prove she was under 18. “To my mind, the (birth) certificate… cannot be said to be useful to the prosecution for several reasons… Not only that, from the certificate… it reveals that the names of the father and mother of the girl are not mentioned as mentioned in a report… As such, to my mind, it can be said that no plausible documentary evidence is placed on record by the prosecution to prove the exact age of the girl on the alleged date of the incident.”The judge said while the FIR suggested the year of birth was 2000, the school certificate indicated 2002. While the prosecution attempted to prove the girl had an IQ of 36, the judge found this claim unproven.
