NOIDA: A 47-year-old man was on Monday sentenced to rigorous life imprisonment for the rape of a seven-month-old infant in Dankaur on July 6, 2022. JP Bhati, special public prosecutor, said the childs injuries were so grievous in nature that she was still undergoing treatment for it. According to him, the girl was sleeping on a cot with her grandfather in the courtyard of their house when the accused — Manoj — arrived.He asked the elderly man for a matchbox to light up a beedi and assaulted the girl when he went to a neighbours house to fetch one.Dr Kajal Jain, the emergency medical officer at the Bhangel health centre where the bleeding girl was taken, said she had a 5cm laceration wound. Dr Richa Mishra, another doctor who treated the child, said she was crying and oozing blood from her wounds. An investigation showed her vagina and hymen were torn. We had to conduct a surgery to seal the wounds, she added.The girls father, a factory worker who was out, lodged a complaint at Dankaur police station. Manoj was caught and handed over to police. A chargesheet was filed against him on July 11, 2022. Manoj decided to face trial.The prosecution produced 12 witnesses, among them the girls family members, doctors and police officers. The girls 11-year-old sister told the court she was playing at a distance when Manoj arrived and her grandfather left to get a matchbox. I saw him lying on the cot, next to my sister. After some time, I heard my sister shouting. When I rushed there, I saw Manoj uncle holding onto my sister and assaulting her, she added.The elder sister shouted for help. I was so scared that I shouted and called out to my family members. They rushed out and caught Manoj uncle, she told the court. Manojs lawyers, Kedar Yadav and Brajesh Solanki, produced two defence witnesses, who told the court the girls grandfather had taken a Rs 4 lakh loan from Manoj. That day, Manoj took us along with him to demand the money back. But the elderly man refused to repay him, which led to an argument. Some of his neighbours gathered around and caught us. Manoj was sent to jail on false charges, one of the defence witnesses said. The court relied on medical evidence and testimonies of the witnesses. The penetrative sexual offence on the body of a victim of 7 months is an offence of extremely heinous nature and speaks a lot about the mental status of the convict. The act of the convict was so brutal that even after a lapse of months of the incident, the victim was not fully recovered. Hence, in the opinion of this court, the convict does not deserve leniency, Vikas Nagar, special judge (Pocso), observed in his 24-page order on Monday.Apart from the life term, the court also imposed a Rs 50,000 fine on Manoj, 90% of which will be paid to the girls father.

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