Rape of even woman of easy virtue

impermissible: SC
Every woman has a right to protect her dignity and cannot be subjected to rape only because she was
habituated to sexual intercourse, the SC said.

New Delhi: Even if a woman is of easy virtue, she cannot be subjected to rape, the Supreme
Court has held, saying courts have a duty to determine whether the offence has been
committed or not.

"Even in cases where there is some material to show that the victim was habituated to sexual
intercourse, no inference of the victim being a woman of 'easy virtue' or a woman of 'loose
moral character' can be drawn," the court said.

"Such a woman has a right to protect her dignity and cannot be subjected to rape only for that
reason. She has a right to refuse to submit herself to sexual intercourse to anyone and
everyone because she is not a vulnerable object or prey for being sexually assaulted by
anyone and everyone," the apex court said.

A bench of justices BS Chauhan and Dipak Misra passed the judgement while acquitting a
man Narendra Kumar convicted for allegedly raping a housewife in his neighbourhood.

The apex court, however, set aside the concurrent findings of the trial court and the Delhi
High Court which had awarded seven years sentence on Kumar for the offence alleged
committed at Chirag Delhi in 1999. In the present case the bench said the victim's version had
lot of infirmities and hence the convicted deserved acquittal.

"Where evidence of the prosecutrix is found suffering from serious infirmities and
inconsistencies with other material, prosecutrix making deliberate improvements on material
point with a view to rule out consent on her part and there being no injury on her person even
though her version may be otherwise, no reliance can be placed upon her evidence," Justice
Chauhan writing the judgement said.

However, the apex court rejected Kumar's argument that the victim was of loose character
and had developed intimacy with a number of persons.