O n August 6, the Goa Division Bench of the Bombay High Court set aside the 2021 judgment of the trial court that had acquitted Tarun Tejpal. The High Court convicted Tejpal, the former editor of Tehelka magazine, and sentenced him to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment for raping a former colleague.
In short, in the eyes of the court, Devi’s caste status made her an unlikely ‘ideal victim’. This remark placed the survivor’s sexual behaviour at the centre of the court’s assessment, effectively questioning her status as an ‘ideal victim’. Similarly, in the gang-rape case of social worker Bhanwari Devi (1992) that became a catalyst for the formulation of the Vishakha guidelines and later, the enactment of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, the Jaipur District and Sessions Court in 1995 acquitted the accused of gang rape. In 2017, in an interim order, a Punjab and Haryana High Court division bench suspended the sentences and granted bail to three former Jindal Global Law School students convicted of gang-raping and blackmailing a classmate.
the High Court also said that it had fallen for the notion that a sexual assault complainant must be a ‘perfect victim’ and conduct herself in a certain way to appear credible While terming the trial court’s ruling “perverse”. The court reasoned that it was unlikely that upper caste men would “pollute” themselves by having sexual relations with a Dalit woman. It described the survivor’s behaviour as having a “perverse streak”. The court said, “…We are conscious of the fact that allegations of the victim regarding her being threatened into submission and blackmail lend sufficient diabolism to the offence, but a careful examination of her statement again offers an alternate conclusion of misadventure stemming from a promiscuous attitude and a voyeuristic mind.
The Tejpal case
In 2021, in the Tejpal case, the Goa Sessions Court noted that there were several discrepancies in the survivor’s versions. It also said that while the victim had claimed to be in shock and trauma after exiting the lift on November 7, 2013, the CCTV footage showed that she was composed and smiling. The Supreme Court, while acquitting the accused policemen, noted the absence of any alarm or resistance from the survivor or injuries on her body. The High Court criticised the Sessions Court for focusing on the complainant’s conduct, reactions, and personal background instead of the evidence on record. It also noted that a survivor has already faced trauma and might feel too ashamed, nervous, or confused to respond clearly when questioned repeatedly in an unfamiliar environment.
For instance, in the 1979 Mathura custodial rape case of a teenager, the Sessions Court had relied on the survivor’s previous sexual experience to reason that she had likely consented, and described her as “habituated to sexual intercourse”.
