Delhi HC cuts POCSO sentence from 20 to 15 years: 2019 minimum does not reach a 2016 offence
Justice Madhu Jain upheld the conviction, rejecting claims of tutoring, delay, a missing DNA profile and a loan-dispute motive, but held that the sentence is governed by Section 6 as it stood in June 2016, with a minimum of ten years.
On 5 November 2026 the Delhi High Court upheld a man’s conviction for the aggravated penetrative sexual assault of an eight-year-old girl, and cut his sentence from twenty years to fifteen.
The offence was committed in June 2016. The court held that the 2019 amendment raising the minimum to twenty years does not apply to it, and it weighed the sentence afresh under the older law.
Justice Madhu Jain decided the appeal by Navratan, who was convicted under Section 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012. To protect the survivor, this report omits her name and every detail that could identify her or her family.
What the trial court decided
A Special Court (POCSO) at the Saket Courts convicted Navratan on 6 November 2020, holding that he committed aggravated penetrative sexual assault under Section 5(m) of the Act on 5 June 2016. On 10 December 2020 it sentenced him to 20 years’ rigorous imprisonment, a fine of Rs 10,000 and six months’ simple imprisonment in default.
The trial court also awarded the girl Rs 4 lakh in compensation. Rs 50,000 was to be released at once, and the rest held in seven fixed deposits of Rs 50,000 each, payable when she turns 18.
The prosecution case was that the girl was playing outside her home when the accused took her to a room and assaulted her. He threatened to kill her if she told anyone. The incident came to light on 15 June 2016, when she complained of pain while her mother was bathing her.
Her parents went to the police on 16 June. She was examined at AIIMS that day, and her statement was recorded before a Magistrate on 17 June.
Twelve witnesses and a false-case defence
The prosecution examined twelve witnesses. They included the girl, the AIIMS doctor, her mother, the school principal, a landlord, and the three investigating officers.
When questioned under Section 313, Navratan denied everything. He said there had been frequent quarrels with the girl’s family and that she had been used to settle a score. He chose to lead defence evidence, and called one witness.
What the appellant argued
Counsel for Navratan argued that the trial court had shifted the burden of proof and that the child’s testimony was inconsistent. He pointed out that in her examination-in-chief she described one act, but agreed to a leading question from the prosecutor about another.
He also said a child witness is open to tutoring, citing Pradeep v. State of Haryana and Pramila v. State of Uttar Pradesh, and he said the eleven days before the FIR were unexplained.
On the evidence, he said the medical report found no fresh tear and recorded an attempt at penetration that was not completed. The forensic report had found no semen and no male DNA profile.
His defence witness, a friend, said the accused had lent Rs 20,000 to the girl’s mother and was falsely implicated when he asked for it back. In the alternative, he asked for the sentence to be cut to the time served, about 11 years including remission.
The State and the amicus reply
Mr Raghuvinder Verma, Additional Public Prosecutor, said the child’s account was consistent on the material points. The delay was explained by the threat, he said, and a missing DNA profile could not by itself discredit her.
The amicus curiae for the survivor, Mr Rajesh Kumar Singh, said the medical record showed the hymen was not intact. The loan story, he added, differed from the suggestion put to the mother, and the defence witness had admitted he never demanded repayment.
Proving she was under twelve
The court began with age, relying on P. Yuvaprakash v. State and Birka Shiva v. State of Telangana. A school entry is admissible, but its value depends on who supplied the information.
Here, the school principal produced the original admission register and form, which recorded a birth date of 25 March 2008 on the strength of an affidavit by the child’s mother. The mother also testified. The court found the source of the entry identifiable, and the girl was eight years, two months and eleven days old on 5 June 2016.
Tutoring, inconsistency and delay
On tutoring, the court accepted that a child witness needs careful scrutiny. But it noted that apart from a suggestion put to her, nothing showed the girl had been tutored, and she had denied it.
She had given a specific account of penile-vaginal penetration. The variations related to how she came to be in the room. Her affirmative answer about another act came when the prosecutor put a leading question, and when the trial judge asked whether she understood the word used, she said no.
Her mother was not an eyewitness, the court observed, but a witness to the first disclosure. Her general phrase for what the child told her was no contradiction of the child’s specific account, since she was only reporting the disclosure.
On delay, the court cited State of Punjab v. Gurmit Singh for the rule that delay in reporting sexual offences cannot be judged mechanically. The child first disclosed on 15 June, and the family went to the police the next day.
Medical and forensic evidence
The examination was on 16 June 2016, eleven days after the offence. It found the hymen not intact but no fresh tear, and the court said a minor injury may heal in that time.
It cited Radha Krishna Nagesh v. State of Andhra Pradesh and State of Himachal Pradesh v. Manga Singh for the proposition that the absence of hymenal rupture or external injury does not by itself negate sexual assault. The court held that the absence of a fresh tear
“does not render the allegation of penetration improbable” (para 51)
The forensic report of 30 September 2016 recorded no semen in the samples and no male DNA profile. The judge stressed that it did not record a DNA mismatch.
With no usable profile, there was nothing to compare with the appellant’s. Samples were taken eleven days after the offence, and the girl may have bathed in the meantime. Citing Sunil v. State of Madhya Pradesh, the judge held that a missing profile was no proof that the act did not happen.
The medical report also noted a cut scar over the groin. Since the doctor gave no opinion on its age or cause, the court did not attribute it to the offence either way.
The court clarified that the medical and forensic evidence was not treated as independent proof of involvement. It simply did not discredit the girl’s account.
The loan defence collapses
The defence witness admitted he did not know whether the appellant had ever asked for repayment, and that he never demanded it himself. He also admitted that the accused had never told him the money had not been returned.
He was a close friend of the appellant, and his account of a quarrel was not based on personal knowledge. The mother denied any loan, and the investigating officer knew of no money transaction.
The court held that the absence of a written loan document alone was not the point. The witness could not show any demand, dispute or grievance that could explain a false case.
Why fifteen years, not twenty
The trial court had noted that Navratan was married with a large family to support and had no previous involvement in any case. It then imposed twenty years.
On sentence, the court held that Section 6 as it stood on the date of the offence governs. It prescribed a minimum of ten years, extendable to imprisonment for life, and the 2019 increase of the minimum to twenty years was held inapplicable.
The judge then applied Gopal Singh v. State of Uttarakhand on proportionality, which looks at the gravity of the offence, the offender’s antecedents and his potential for reform. The court said
“a substantial custodial sentence is warranted” (para 59)
given the girl’s age and the nature of the offence. It also weighed his satisfactory conduct in custody and the absence of established criminal antecedents, and fixed fifteen years.
Order
The conviction under Section 6 of the POCSO Act was upheld. The sentence of 20 years’ rigorous imprisonment was reduced to 15 years, while the fine of Rs 10,000 and six months’ simple imprisonment in default were left unchanged.
The appeal was partly allowed on 5 November 2026. A copy of the judgment was directed to the trial court and the Jail Superintendent.