Coaxing The Court By Tagging Consensual Sex As “Rape” Will Be Too Old To Work Now
With increasing numbers of misdemeanours, and also fake cases related to this, country’s law is getting brisk and smarter. Cajoling the court by tagging consensual sex as “rape” will be too old to work now. Recently, the Bombay high court granted bail to a 21 year old boy because his previous girlfriend lodged the case of rape against him after they had broke up. This was decided under the shade of rule that a promise to marry cannot be taken as an inducement in every other rape case.
Justice Mridula Bhatkar justified the decision by quoting that if the educated girl consented to get into pre-marital sex, then she herself should be responsible for that choice and cannot lodge a complaint against that boy.
Justice Bhatkar explained it like, “In the event of consent obtained by fraud, inducement is a necessary ingredient. There should be some material on record to believe prima facie that the girl was induced to such an extent that she was ready to have sexual intercourse. Promise to marry cannot be said to be an inducement in these types of cases”.
The judge promptly mentioned that, in the changing society, the baggage of morality is still on and we have been carrying it all along. She mentioned it like, “Since generations, there is a moral taboo that it is the responsibility of a woman to be a virgin at the time of marriage. However, today, the young generation is exposed to different interactions with each other and is well informed about sexual activities. Society is trying to be liberated but carries baggage of different notions of morality wherein sex before marriage is a matter of censure. Under such circumstances, a woman who is in love with a boy forgets that to have sex is her option like her counterpart’s but refuses to take responsibility for her decision.”
This is clear indication towards the running trend of criminal cases where the end of the relationship turns into a rape case. By adopting this point of view, the court will try to balance the liberty of the accused with the girl’s sufferings which will result in more sensible outcomes.
