Aspecial POCSO court has acquitted a 35-year-old man who was accused of sexually assaulting his 11-year-old daughter. The man was acquitted after his daughter told the court that she had made the allegations at the behest of her cousin.
The accused told the court that he was falsely implicated by the cousin as he had made remarks about her character. The alleged incident took place in August 2020 and the man was arrested in October.
“The prosecution has failed to produce on record cogent and reliable evidence,” the court said. The court observed that a child subjected to sexual violence would not insist on living with her father rather than her mother.
“The prosecutrix (daughter) was not ready to go with her mother to Panvel when her mother asked her to. Not only the prosecutrix, but her two sisters are also staying with their father,” the court said.
“It is brought on record that the accused being her father would take care of her, even focusing on her studies and cooking for her…so it is not digestible and is difficult to believe that the father did any wrong thing with the prosecutrix,” the court said.
The court also observed that since the child was living with her cousin while the accused was behind bars, the daughter could not have been pressured by her parents to depose in favour of her father.