New Delhi: Delhi High Court has said that a DNA report only proves paternity and not the offence of rape or absence of consent, while acquitting a rape convict sentenced to a 10-year jail term.
In a recent order, Justice Amit Mahajan said that though the DNA report established the child born to the woman was biologically fathered by the accused, the pregnancy itself was “insufficient” to prove the offence of rape unless it was also proved that the act was non-consensual.
“The DNA report merely proves paternity — it does not and cannot, by itself, establish the absence of consent. It is trite law that the offence under Section 376 (rape) of the IPC hinges on the absence of consent,” the court said, adding that circumstances surrounding the case rendered the prosecution’s case “highly improbable”.
The high court did not rule out the possibility of the FIR — registered belatedly without an explanation — being a “reaction to social pressure.”
Giving the benefit of the doubt to the convict, the court said the “possibility that the allegations were made to retrospectively reframe a consensual relationship as rape, in order to shield the prosecutrix and her family from societal backlash, cannot be ruled out.”
It added that the law “of course, does not presume consent merely from silence. But it also does not convict in the absence of proof beyond reasonable doubt. And in this case, doubt persists — not due to conjecture, but due to the evidence itself.”
While the woman’s testimony was found to be inconsistent, the court flagged the absence of medical and forensic evidence to establish rape. Despite being an adult, educated and living with family, the court noted, the woman offered no explanation on why she did not approach the authorities earlier.
It noted that the woman continued to visit the man’s home to play Ludo over an extended period and even developed an affection for him. Further, there was no medical evidence to indicate force or resistance, and there was inconsistency in the prosecutrix’s narrative that diminished the credibility of her testimony, it said.
The woman alleged that the man, who lived in her neighbourhood, raped her multiple times after inviting her to his house on the pretext of playing Ludo.
An FIR against the man was registered in Jan 2018, and a trial court convicted him in Dec 2022. He challenged his punishment on the ground that his relationship with the woman was consensual.