A special court in Mumbai has sentenced a retired police constable to five years of imprisonment for molesting a 13-year-old girl while on duty at a hospital in suburban Mulund in 2017.
Special Judge Kalpana Patil convicted the 58-year-old accused under IPC section 354 (A) (molestation) and relevant provisions of the POCSO Act on March 22.
However, the accused constable was acquitted of the offence under IPC section 506 for criminal intimidation. The court, relying on the testimony of the victim and other evidence, concluded that the prosecution had successfully proved the charge of molestation against the accused. The court noted that for charges under IPC section 506, the prosecution must prove that the accused threatened the victim girl with injury to her reputation, property, or person. The court observed that from the statement of the victim girl, it does not appear that the accused gave a specific threat that would cause alarm to the victim girl.
The girl had accompanied her mother to a hospital in Mulund after her mother was injured during a quarrel with their neighbour on the night of October 19, 2017. In her testimony, the woman claimed that after receiving first aid and medicine, she and her daughter waited at the hospital, where she noticed a ‘Police Kaksha’ (police booth).
She approached the constable present there and narrated the incident of the quarrel with her neighbour, asking for help. However, she was directed to visit Bhandup police station. The woman then requested the constable if she could sit in the police booth for some time with her minor daughter, a class 9 student, as it was late at night.
When the woman went to attend to nature’s call, the constable allegedly touched the girl inappropriately, according to the prosecution.
The victim started crying when she and her mother left the hospital on October 20 morning. She narrated her ordeal to her mother and revealed that the constable had also threatened her not to disclose the incident, the prosecution said. The mother returned to the hospital and reported the incident to the medical officer, who called the police, and a case was registered against the accused Sharad Hande, who was posted at the booth. Hande was arrested from the hospital immediately. The court relied on the testimony of the victim and her mother, corroborated by doctors, a hospital watchman, and other witnesses who saw the duo in the hospital and also in CCTV footage.
