Unnao rape victim's tumultuous path to vindication

NEW DELHI: "The instant case manifest [sic] the multitudes of restrictions and taboos within which many women in the rural areas are brought up, grow and survive. It epitomizes the fear ingrained in the mind of young girl [sic] in the countryside or elsewhere against reporting the issues of sexual assault by powerful adults," Principal Judge Dharmesh Sharma remarked as he convicted former BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar in the Unnao rape case, where he raped a 17-year-old girl at his Unnao home in June 2017.

However, the conviction in this case has come after the rape victim was allegedly gang-raped by Sengar's henchmen weeks after the initial incident, the rape victim's father was falsely framed in an Arms Act case and then killed in custody, repeated life-threats to herself and her family members, a continuous effort to keep the rape victim's uncle in jail and an attempt to kill her, her lawyer and her aunts in what was allegedly made to look like an accident.

Despite the ordeals that the Unnao rape victim and her family went through, the court established the victim's testimony in the case as "unblemished, truthful and of 'sterling quality'", only after examining six prosecution witnesses, including the victim herself and her mother, who first attested to the fact that she was a minor at the time of her rape. It then had to establish why the victim had not reported the incident immediately, which was done by proving that Sengar had threatened her not to implicate him.

The victim then had to explain why she did not mention Sengar's name in her statement to the magistrate and then narrate how the local MLA had launched a vicious tirade against her father and uncle, to make sure her uncle, who is the sole breadwinner in the family, stayed behind bars.

While it was not enough that the victim had to try and immolate herself outside UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's residence before getting the nation to pay attention; after her father was killed in custody, the victim, her two aunts and her lawyer were hit by a truck near Rae Bareilly. Both the rape victim's aunts were killed in the crash, which put the victim and her lawyer in critical condition. Early on, it was revealed that the truck in the accident had its number plates deliberately blackened.

Days before the accident at the end of July this year, the victim's family had written to the Chief Justice of India, asking that the Unnao cases be transferred to Delhi as they were receiving death threats from Sengar's men.

In fact, on September 1 this year, Millennium Post had reported how the Unnao cases, assigned for a speedy trial to a Lucknow special judge, had not seen any progress after the CBI had filed its chargesheet. This newspaper had learnt at the time that the Allahabad High Court had stopped monitoring the case based on incorrect information that the trial was underway. As a result, the special court for the case had curiously disappeared from official records.

The CBI had filed two chargesheet in Special Court, CBI court number 4 in Lucknow in July last year, of which the court had taken cognizance. However, Judge Vatsal Srivastava of the same court was transferred out on April 15 and the court itself had seemingly disappeared from the list of Special CBI courts on the Allahabad High Court website, leaving no designated court for the Unnao cases.

On the same day, then-cji Ranjan Gogoi took cognizance of media reports and ordered that all Unnao cases be transferred to Delhi for trial. The CJI also handed all investigations in the matter to the CBI and provided for the rape victim, her family and her lawyer to be moved to Delhi for the duration of the trial.

After 2 1/2 years of mutliple attempts at her life, a constant campaign to silence her and continuous life threats to her and her family, the Unnao rape victim has been vindicated as MLA Kuldeep Sengar faces life sentence for raping her