CHHATRAPATI SAMBHAJINAGAR: Awarding a sentence lower than the minimal statutory sentence prescribed below an Act is now not permissible, the Bombay high court’s Aurangabad bench has held whereas sentencing a rape convict to twenty years in penal complex as in opposition to the 7 years given by a diversified court in Nanded on June 20, 2024, in a case below POCSO Act of 2012.The bench of Justice Rajnish R Vyas on Feb 6 exercised the appellate court’s powers below Fragment 386 of the Code of Criminal Course of (CrPC) to sentence the convict in the rape of a a 15-twelve months-ragged woman, to twenty years in penal complex as an alternate of the previously awarded sentence.“The trial court has rightly convicted nevertheless has now not imposed statutory minimal sentence on the accused,” the bench acknowledged. “The amplify in the length of sentence would be a final end result of awarding the statutory minimal sentence (two decades for conviction below Fragment 6 of POCSO Act i.e. aggravated penetrative sexual assault), nevertheless it indubitably can now not be called an enhancement of the sentence,” acknowledged Justice Vyas.
