Home
High Court on Martial rape: ‘rape is rape, be it man or husband’
Equating sexual assault by a husband on his wife with rape, the Karnataka high court (HC) has refused to quash proceedings against a man accused of alleged rape by his wife.
“A man is a man; an act is an act; rape is a rape, be it performed by a man, the `husband`, on the woman, ‘wife’,” said Justice M. Nagaprasanna on Wednesday.
The single-judge bench of the Karnataka HC was hearing a case filed by a woman against her husband for treating her as a `sex slave` ever since they were married. The husband has been accused of forcing his wife into unnatural sex in the presence of their daughter too.
Referring to exceptions in IPC Section 375 that says, “Sexual intercourse or sexual acts by a man with his own wife, the wife not being under 15 years of age, is not rape,” Justice Nagaprasanna said, exempting a husband for his acts, destroys the Right to Equality which is the soul of the Constitution.
Terming the exception as regressive, the court put the onus of amending this provision of IPC Section 376, on the legislature.
Even though the Justice J.S. Verma Committee, appointed by the Union government, had recommended deleting the exception of marital rape, the subsequent amendment only replaced the word `rape` with `sexual assault` in IPC section 375, the Judge added.
Home
What monkey fled with a bag containing evidence in it: Read full story
The court, generally, considers a person who commit a crime and the one who destroys the evidence, as criminals in the eyes of law. But what if an animal destroys the evidence of a crime committed by a human.
In a peculiar incident in Rajasthan, a monkey fled away with the evidence collected by the police in a murder case. The stolen evidence included the murder weapon (a blood-stained knife).
The incident came to light when the police appeared before the court and they had to provide the evidence in the hearing.
The hearing was about the crime which took place in September 2016, in which a person named Shashikant Sharma died at a primary health center under Chandwaji police station. After the body was found, the deceased’s relatives blocked the Jaipur-Delhi highway, demanding an inquiry into the matter.
Following the investigation, the police had arrested Rahul Kandera and Mohanlal Kandera, residents of Chandwaji in relation to the murder. But, when the time came to produce the evidence related to the case, it was found that the police had no evidence with them because a monkey had stolen it from them.
In the court, the police said that the knife, which was the primary evidence, was also taken by the monkey. The cops informed that the evidence of the case was kept in a bag, which was being taken to the court.
The evidence bag contained the knife and 15 other important evidences. However, due to the lack of space in the malkhana, a bag full of evidence was kept under a tree, which led to the incident.