Within a month, court gives lifer to 5 for raping teen

BHUBANESWAR: Five men from Odisha’s Sambalpur district were on Saturday sentenced to life imprisonment for gang-raping a 16-year-old girl 30 days back.

On May 3, the girl was allegedly gang-raped by her boyfriend, Afzal, and four other friends in two different places in Sambalpur. She committed suicide by hanging herself at her home on May 23.

After a marathon trial of 14 hours, which ended at 10pm on Saturday, special Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) judge, Udaybhanu Jena, sentenced Afzal and his friends to life under section 6 of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act and section 376(D) of Indian Penal Code (IPC), said public prosecutor Artatrana Mishra. The court also slapped a fine of ₹50,000 on each of them. The other accused are Ashirbad Behera, Abhilash Panchbhia, Tinu Sahu, and Hadu Panchbhia.

“Afzal was the main accused who first sexually assaulted the girl and then asked his friends to assault her,” Mishra said, adding that the final hearing began at 7.30am on Saturday and 21 witnesses were produced.

A juvenile who was witness to the crime and an accused in the case is being separately tried in a juvenile justice court.

This is the fastest judgment in a rape case in Odisha. Last month, a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra had asked all high courts to ensure fast-tracking of trials of all cases related to sexual assault on children.

The 15-year-old girl’s mother had said in her complaint that her daughter, a Class 9 student of Sasan area in the district, was on her way home from a local market on May 2 when the juvenile approached her for a conversation, a police officer was quoted as saying. He took her to an isolated place, raped her and abandoned her. The girl was spotted by five other youths, who also took turns to rape her, the officer said quoting the FIR. Based on the complaint, police arrested the accused over the next three days.