The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Tamil Nadu Government on a petition, challenging the March 16 order of the Madras High Court, refusing to allow an application filed by a teenager accused of seeking to compound the offence of rape. The high court held that offences under the POCSO Act were non-compoundable.

Twitter
Facebook
Youtube
Instagram
Share Article

Aa
NATION
Can consensual sex between consenting teenagers be punishable under POCSO Act?

The high court held that offences under the POCSO Act were non-compoundable

Google News
Updated At: Mar 28, 2021 10:48 PM
Beautiful Image
Photo for representation only. Source: iStock.
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, March 28

Can adolescents having consensual sex be punished under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012 for rape?

The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Tamil Nadu Government on a petition, challenging the March 16 order of the Madras High Court, refusing to allow an application filed by a teenager accused of seeking to compound the offence of rape.

The high court held that offences under the POCSO Act were non-compoundable.

The High Court had also dismissed the rape complainant’s plea for permission to depose before the trial court to bring it on record that her sexual relations with the accused were consensual in nature.

A Bench headed by Justice Indira Banerjee on Friday issued the notice after the petitioner’s counsel submitted that the top court needed to consider if adolescents in a live-in relationship or those having consensual sex should be punished under the POCSO Act.

It also gave interim protection from arrest to the petitioner accused.

The trial court had in 2019 refused to take the complainant evidence on record, saying she had not filed the petition through the public prosecutor.

It held the petitioner guilty under the POCSO Act and sentenced him to 10-year imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 5,000. It also asked him to pay a compensation of Rs 1 lakh to the victim.

Now, he contended before the top court that the objective of the POCSO Act was not to punish teenagers engaging in consensual sex.

The accused and the complainant fell in love while studying in school and the accused allegedly established a sexual relationship with her on the pretext of marriage.

The girl filed a rape complaint in 2015 after he allegedly refused to marry her, saying his parents wanted him to marry another girl.

Besides rape and cheating, he was also accused of causing miscarriage and repeatedly committing penetrative sexual assault aggravated penetrative sexual assault under POCSO Act as the victim was a 17-year-old minor.

During the trial, the complainant said she was not forced to engage in sexual relations with the accused and her statements were made at the behest of the states.

She said she wanted to live with the petitioner with whom she had been in a live-in relationship.

This High Court suspended the sentence in June 2019. In February this year, the complainant came out in support of the petitioner and contended she had been in a live-in relationship with him for four years and that their sexual relations were consensual and that they intended to get married.

But the high court turned it down on March 16.