New Delhi: Two men have been sentenced to 10 years rigorous imprisonment by a Delhi court for gang-raping a 28-year-old woman despite the victim resiling from her statement.
Additional Sessions Judge M C Gupta awarded the jail term to 35-year-old Hari Ram and 22-year-old Suresh, both residents of Delhi, and also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 each.
"It stands clearly established on the record, of the performance of the act of sexual intercourse by accused Suresh and Hari Ram with the woman against her will," the court said.
The court rejected the plea of the convicts that there was a delay in lodging FIR which was fatal for the prosecution.
The court noted that after the incident, the woman was in fear as the two men had threatened her not to disclose it to anyone and she was afraid that her husband would beat her.
This was the reason that she informed her sister-in-law about the incident who took her to the police station and lodged a case against the two accused, it noted.
"The sight cannot be lost of the fact that the Indian women has tendency to conceal offence of sexual assault because it involves her prestige as well as prestige of her family. Only in few cases, the victim girl or the family has the courage to go before the police and lodge a case," the judge said.
According to the prosecution, the woman was earlier working in a factory where Suresh was also employed. She had left the job a few days before the incident on June 14, 2009 in a factory in Indra Enclave in north west Delhi.
Hari Ram was the owner of the rented house where factory was being operated. Suresh had called the woman to collect her dues from the contractor in the factory, it said.
She reached the factory in the evening where Suresh and Hari Om were present and they asked her to sit in a room, it said, adding that thereafter they bolted the door.
Both the men took turns to rape her, police said, adding that, the woman received few injuries also as she resisted.
The woman changed her statement in the court and said she had maintained physical relations with Suresh of her own and Hari Om had not done anything.
She had filed a case against them as her husband had seen her in a compromising position with Suresh, she said.
The court, however, said the woman`s testimony on material aspects was found to be corroborated by the statement of her sister-in-law whom she had disclosed the facts relating to the crime shortly after incident.
The court also said that the forensic evidence proved that she was raped by the two men.
