Breaking: Bombay High Court Directs Trial Court To Redact References On Victim's Identity In Tarun Tejpal Judgment

The Single Bench of Justice SC Gupte has also granted 3 days' time to the State, to amend the grounds of appeal against the acquittal order dated May 21, that was made available on May 25.

"Solicitor General seeks time to put the order on record and amend the grounds of appeal. He offers to do so in 3 days, we direct the state to amend the appeal accordingly. The hearing is on Wed, 2nd June 2021," the Bench said while adjourning the matter.

On Tuesday, the State filed an appeal against the Tejpal acquittal on all charges by the District and Sessions Court at Mapusa, Goa. He was accused of forcing himself on the woman, against her wishes, inside an elevator of the Grand Hyatt, Bambolim, Goa on November 7 and 8, 2013, during the newsmagazine's official event - the THiNK 13 festival.

In her 527-page judgement, Special Judge Kshama Joshi extensively commented on the woman's non-rape victim like behaviour and faulty investigation to grant Tejpal the benefit of the doubt.

Photos Showed Her To Be Cheerful, Not Traumatized, No 'Rape-Victim' Behaviour : Goa Court In Tarun Tejpal Case

Taking objection to this, SGI Tushar Mehta submitted,

"As per this judgement, any victim of sexual assault has to exhibit her trauma, and unless she does that her testimony cannot be believed."

Mehta also took objection to the manner in which the Trial Court has interpreted the action of the victim in seeking legal advice.

"This girl, who is a victim of sexual abuse by person who is her father's friend, approached an eminent counsel Indira Jaising, whose ability, competence and integrity cannot be questioned by anyone. She rightly took advice because you need to go to a lawyer whom you can trust. Unfortunately, for the first time in our Indian jurisprudence, the court records that there is every possibility of doctoring of events? How can counsel of this eminence be a party to doctoring? I take offence," he said.

At this juncture, the High Court inquired why a regular appeal was not filed. "Why can't this go before a regular court?" Justice Gupte asked.

To this Mehta responded,

"In such matters, the systems expects sensitivity, apart from legal jurisprudence. Both of which are lacking in this case. We owe it to our girls, that this is taken up by the high court at the earliest."

He further told the Bench that the judgment discloses identity of the victim and also reveals her husband's, which is prohibited under Section 228A of IPC.

In this backdrop the Court observed,

"It appears from the order of the Sessions Judge, which is available to this court (not yet uploaded on trial court website) contains the reference to the victim's husband and also her email id.

Considering the law against disclosure of the identity of the victim of an offence such as the one in which we are concerned, it is in the interest of justice to have these paras redacted.We direct the trial court to redact the identities, whilst uploading the judgement.

State's counsel points out that there is a reference to the victim's mother's name in one of the paragraphs which should also be redacted. Court directs accordingly."