Delhi Court acquits Navy officer accused in rape case on benefit of doubt

A Delhi court has acquitted an officer working with Indian Navy in a rape case, after noting discrepancies in different versions of the incident narrated by the alleged victim.

Additional Sessions Judge Ankur Jain granted benefit of doubt to the Lt Commander after noting that at three different stages, three different versions were given by the woman who had accused him of rape.

The court noted that it is quite unnatural that the victim did not tell anything to her mother just after the incident or even thereafter and waited for about two days till the time marriage was called off by the mother of the accused.

The court took note of the different versions of the incident by the woman. As per the woman, she got engaged to the accused in 2015 and with the permission of family members and they used to talk on the mobile phone regularly.

In the complaint, the woman alleged that she was raped by the accused at a family gathering at her uncle's house and thereafter the FIR was lodged at the Janakpuri police station under section 376 IPC.

The court said it appears that the present complaint was made to pressurise the accused to enter into a matrimonial alliance, succumbing to the pressure at the time of hearing of the bail application, accused had married the prosecutrix which is reflected from the bail order and the photographs so placed on record.

The alliance did not survive and ultimately both of them took divorce, the court added.

The accused's counsel argued that the relationship between the two parties was consensual in nature and no alleged crime was committed by his client.