‘No template of apt behaviour after assault’: Experts weigh in on verdict

The Mapusa sessions court, which acquitted journalist Tarun Tejpal who was being tried for raping a junior colleague, contended that the survivor’s account “neither demonstrates any kind of normative behaviour on her own part that a prosecutrix of sexual assault on consecutive two nights might plausibly show, nor does it demonstrate any such behaviour on the part of the accused.”

In the judgment, a copy of which was made available on Wednesday, Additional Sessions judge Kshama Joshi said that the

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prosecutrix did not prove herself a sterling witness, and pulled up the Goa police, which was investigating the case, for destroying evidence that was “inconvenient” to the investigation.

The former editor of Tehelka magazine was accused of raping a junior colleague in an elevator of a five-star hotel in Goa during the THINK festival in November 2013. The complainant alleged that Tejpal had raped her in a lift in the hotel on November 7 and attempted to assault her again on November 8.

Tejpal, who refuted the charges in court, was acquitted by the fasttrack court on May 21. The Goa government filed an appeal against the verdict in the Bombay high court on Tuesday.

Experts point out that there is no template of correct behaviour after or even during an incident of sexual assault, rape and harassment.

Often survivors feel the need to appear “normal” out of fear of retribution by the assailant, activists said. “There is a belief that a woman should react in a certain way to be worthy of justice. However, there cannot not be a SOP of how a woman should behave after sexual assault,” Mumbaibased women’s rights lawyer Veena Gowda said.