6 year delay in rape FIR termed invalid by Delhi court

A man accused of raping a 30-year-old married woman in 2010 after allegedly spiking her drink was discharged by a court on Monday. The court noted that there was no valid jurisdiction for a delay of six years in lodging the FIR. & quot No complaint was lodged by the woman till May 27, 2016, though she was allegedly raped by the accused for the first time on June 16, 2010. As per prosecutrix, she was raped for the last time on May 21, 2016. There is no valid justification for delay in lodging the FIR,& quot said additional sessions judge Praveen Kumar. The man, a Delhi resident, was booked under sections 376 (rape), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) of the Indian Penal Code. The court further said that the delay of one or two days in lodging the FIR may be & quot bonafide, reasonable and justified& quot in a given case. & quot However, in the present case there is delay of more than six years in lodging the FIR.& quot It rejected the claims of the woman that the accused had threatened and blackmailed her with their obscene videos, saying no such videos were recovered by the police during investigation. According to the prosecution, the woman had lodged a complaint in May this year alleging that the accused, who she worked with, came to her house in June 2010 and after spiking her drink, raped her. The man, on the other hand, contended that he knew the complainant and had helped her financially.

OUR TAKE

The above case brings out thecase for timely report and acknowledgement of such atrocities. Now that the court has made its decision, it can be said that on the basis of evidence provided, the man could not be prosectued. But the important point to discuss here is, even if there was evidence and the man was tied, why did the woman wait for six years to file an FIR? If you want justice, you must stand up for it. While we acknowledge the fact that it must have been hard on the woman to come up afterr such an atrocitious crime, we encourage every citizen to be in theknow about the rules and rights everyon is entitled to.