Mumbai: Man sentenced to 6 months in jail for sexually assaulting woman in sharing auto

In a case from 2019, a man was sentenced to six months in jail and imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 for sexually assaulting a woman in a shared auto while travelling from Jogeshwari railway station to Meghwadi.

A court in Mumbai has convicted and sentenced a man to six months of rigorous imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 for inappropriately touching a woman who was sitting next to him in a shared auto rickshaw.

The prosecution case was that on March 7, 2019, the woman had boarded a shared auto rickshaw at 11.20 AM from Jogeshwari to go towards Meghwadi. Since two male passengers were already sitting in the auto, she sat on the left side seat. While on the way, the accused, sitting in the middle, started touching and pressing her breast.

Protesting, the woman caught hold of his hand and raised alarms. Subsequently, she reached the police station and narrated the entire incident to the police. Based on her complaint, an FIR was registered.

While the trial was on Magistrate SAR Sayed, who elaborated that in order to prove the charge for an offence punishable under Section-354-A (Assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty) of the Indian Penal Code, it must be proved that the accused made physical contact and advances involving unwelcome sexual gestures against the victim with an intent to outrage her modesty or with the knowledge that her modesty would be outraged.

Meanwhile, the accused, who also had an opportunity to explain incriminating circumstances in his statement under Section 313 of the Criminal Procedure Code, took a general defense of a false case and that of misunderstanding on the account of his ringing mobile phone, which caused irritation to the informant sitting adjacent to him in sharing auto rickshaw.

To this, the Magistrate said, "Nowhere the presence or sitting position of both the victim and the accused in the same auto rickshaw is disputed. In such a set of facts and circumstances, insistence upon examining co-passengers and the driver of an auto rickshaw does not have any force. It is to be considered that sexual offences/offences against women are always committed in secluded places or in crowded places/ public modes of transport like sharing auto rickshaw, government buses and local trains. Therefore, corroboration of the evidence of the woman is not at all justified."

The Magistrate said, "It is clear that the accused had an intention and motive on his part to encash opportunity in the crowded sharing auto rickshaw by touching the woman sitting next to him. The act of the accused touching her, then pressing the breast of an unknown woman sitting next to him is in itself an intentional act."