Sengar files plea in Delhi HC challenging his conviction
NEW DELHI: Expelled Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar moved the Delhi high court on Wednesday challenging his conviction and life sentence for raping a minor girl in Unnao in 2017.
The plea is yet to be cleared from the Delhi high court registry, following which it could be listed for hearing later. In his plea, Sengar has sought the quashing of the December 16, 2019, judgment of the trial court which convicted him.
He has also sought setting aside of the December 20 order sentencing him to imprisonment till the remainder of his life.
On December 16, the trial court convicted 54-year-old Sengar under various provisions, including Section 376 (2) of the Indian Penal Code which deals with a public servant who “takes advaning tage of his official position and commits rape on a woman in his custody as such public servant or in the custody of a public servant subordinate to him”.
District and sessions judge Dharmesh Sharma awarded Sengar the maximum punishment prison until the “remainder of his natural biological life”, and also imposed an exemplary fine of ~25 lakh to be paid within a month. Sengar was held guilty under various provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act. The court acquitted a co-accused, Shashi Singh, givher the benefit of doubt.
The minor girl was kidnapped and raped by Sengar in 2017.
The trial in the lower court started on August 5 after the apex court transferred the matter to Delhi from Unnao, and hearings were conducted on a day-to-day basis. The Supreme Court, after taking cognisance of the rape survivor’s letter written to the then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi, on August 1 last year transferred all five cases registered in connection with the Unnao rape case from a Lucknow court to a court in Delhi with directions that the trial be completed in 45 days.
Ajendra Awasthi, the lawyer of Unnao rape survivor, said Kuldeep Sengar challenging his conviction in a superior court was his right. “He can approach High Court and Supreme Court, it is well within his rights; we will present our case strongly when the court asks us to do.”
NEW DELHI: In a first, the government looks set to collect data on households headed by a transgender person and members living in the family, home ministry officials said on Wednesday.
Census officers will be seeking specific information based on 31 questions from every household during the house listing and housing census exercise scheduled from April 1 to September 30.
“It is for the first time that information on households headed by a transgender is being collected,” the officials said.
Information will be sought on building number, census house number, predominant material of the floor, wall and roof of the census house, use of census house, condition of the census house, household number and total number of persons normally residing in the household, according to a notification issued by the Registrar General and Census Commissioner.
In 2011, the Census collected data on the number of transgender persons, as well as details on their literacy, caste and employment.
The data was clubbed under ‘Males’ and later released under a separate heading.