MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of Madras High Court has observed that a man pulling a woman’s hand, though would shock her sense of decency, should be coupled with criminal intention to constitute an offence.
Justice RN Manjula made the observations recently while setting aside the conviction and punishment imposed on a caste Hindu man, R Murugesan, for outraging the modesty of an SC woman of unsound mind by pulling her hands when she was grazing cattle in Madurai district in 2015.
Murugesan was booked by Sholavandan police under sections 3(1)(x) of SC/ST Act and 354 of IPC. The trial judge acquitted him from the charges under SC/ST Act and convicted him for the offence under 354 IPC ( assaulting a woman with intent to outrage her modesty), and sentenced him to three years rigorous imprisonment in 2018.
Hearing an appeal filed by Murugesan against his conviction and sentence, Justice Manjula observed that prosecution failed to prove that Murugesan had pulled the victim’s hands with a criminal intention. If the accused had any other intention like pulling the victim away from the centre of a road or to avert any other accident, it cannot be considered as commission of an offence of outraging the modesty based on vague and generalised statements without clear and detailed evidence about the intention, she added.
The judge also observed that the statements of the eyewitnesses were vague and contradictory and not sufficient to convict the accused. Therefore, Murugesan is entitled to benefit of doubt, she held and allowed his appeal.