A 57-year-old man, who sexually assaulted and impregnated a minor girl in 2017, was sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for life by the Mahila Court in Coimbatore.
Sessions judge R. Radhika also ordered the State government to provide ₹5 lakh to the survivor under the victim compensation scheme, considering the nature of the offence committed by the man on the 12-year-old girl, the trauma the girl may have undergone and the period of the ordeal of the trial.
L. Arusamy, a resident of a village near Negamam in Pollachi, was awarded a life term for sexually assaulting and impregnating the minor girl in 2017. The plight of the girl came to light when her mother took her to a hospital. The doctors found that the girl was in her first trimester of pregnancy.
The girl, while undergoing counselling, said she was sexually assaulted by Arusamy on multiple occasions when her parents — both daily wage workers — were away. The man had threatened her against revealing the sexual assaults to anyone. Arusamy was arrested under Sections 5 (l) (whoever commits penetrative sexual assault on the child more than once or repeatedly) and 5 (j) (ii) (whoever commits penetrative sexual assault on a female child and makes her pregnant as a consequence of sexual assault), read with Section 6 (punishment for aggravated penetrative sexual assault) of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and Section 506 (i) (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code, based on a complaint lodged by the girl’s mother with the All Women Police Station, Pollachi, on July 23, 2017.
While Arusamy — also a daily wage worker — was remanded in judicial custody, the girl was admitted to the Coimbatore Medical College Hospital, where her foetus was aborted. The paternity of Arusamy was proved through a DNA test carried out on the foetus that was removed from the girl.
Awarding the sentence, the court observed that the way the accused had behaved with the girl was intolerable, and the acts of the man had put the girl and her parents through a lot of mental agony. The girl's family had to shift their residence to help her continue her education.
Special Public Prosecutor R. Sarojini said the court also imposed a fine of ₹1,500 on Arusamy.
