- The SC has, in the case of X (Minor) vs. The State of Jharkhand, held that once it has been established that the victim / prosecutrix was below the age of consent (below the age of 18 years), the fact that she was in a love affair with the accused and that the accused later refused to marry her were irrelevant considerations so far as the grant of bail is concerned.
- In the instant case, an FIR was registered in Ranchi for offenses punishable under section 376 of IPC and section 6 of the POCSO Act. The case of the prosecution was that when she was a minor, the respondent had taken her to her hotel and had sexual relations with her after promising that he would marry her.
- Not only did he not marry her, but according to the victim, he sent obscene videos of her to her father. The High Court had granted the accused bail and it was against that bail order that the appeal to the Apex Court had been made.
- The Apex Court noted that bail had been granted by the High Court was based on the reasoning that the it had appeared from the 164 statements and also from the FIR that there was a love affair between the petitioner and the respondent and that the case seems to be instituted only on the point of the refusal of the accused to marry her.
- It was argued that at the time of the incident, the victim was 13 years old and the accused was 20. It wasn't like they were both teenagers and that the bail granted by the HC was wholly based on extraneous considerations. The minor was not capable of giving her consent and the incident thus amounts to statutory rape.
- The Apex Court observed that the HC had committed an error in granting bail to the accused on the ground of the alleged love affair between the victim and the accused and that the case was instituted purely on the reason of the accused’s refusal to marry her.
- The Court observed that once it appears prima facie that the victim was only 13 years old, the ground that there was a love affair between the victim and the accused, as well as the alleged refusal to marry, are circumstances which have no bearing to the grant of bail. Having regard to the age of the prosecutrix and the gravity of the crime, the order of the HC had to be interfered with.
- Thus, the Hon’ble SC allowed the application and the bail granted by the HC was set aside.
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