The Delhi high court on Tuesday acquitted Geeta Arora alias Sonu Punjaban and Sandeep Bedwal in a case involving the trafficking of a 12-year-old girl for prostitution.
A bench of Chandrashekharan Sudha set aside the July 2020 trial court judgment that had convicted Punjaban and sentenced her to 24 years’ imprisonment, and Bedwal to 20 years, holding that the prosecution’s case rested primarily on the survivor’s testimony, which suffered from material contradictions and inconsistencies.
In the 71-page judgment, the court noted significant inconsistencies in the survivor’s statements from the FIR to her testimony before the magistrate and the trial court, including discrepancies in the year of the incident, the sequence of events, the roles attributed to the accused, and how she came in contact with the police in 2014.
The court held that the discrepancy regarding the year of the incident was not minor but went to the root of the case. It also noted that the survivor’s account of the alleged rape by Bedwal changed substantially over time.
“The testimony of PW1 suffers from material contradictions, improvements and inconsistencies… In the absence of any independent corroboration, it would be unsafe to sustain the conviction,” the court said.
The court further found serious lapses in the investigation, noting that several alleged links in the trafficking chain were neither properly identified nor apprehended, weakening the prosecution’s case. “Several persons allegedly involved in the chain of trafficking, such as Seema, Khushi, Manisha and others, were neither properly identified nor apprehended. It is true that defects in investigation cannot always enure to the benefit of the accused. But in the case on hand, the failure of the investigating agency to trace these crucial links in the prosecution story further weakens the case against the appellants,” the court noted.
The verdict paves the way for the release of Punjaban, who had already secured bail in other cases. Bedwal is also entitled to release following the acquittal.
The case stems from a 2009 FIR filed by the minor’s father, alleging that Bedwal lured his daughter on the pretext of marriage, raped her, and sold her into prostitution. The prosecution alleged that she was later sold to Punjaban and trafficked to multiple locations.
In 2020, the trial court had convicted Punjaban under multiple Indian Penal Code provisions, awarding a total sentence of 24 years, while Bedwal was sentenced to 20 years under various sections.
During the appeal, counsel for the accused argued that the case relied solely on the survivor’s inconsistent testimony, lacked medical corroboration, and was unsupported by identification evidence. The Delhi Police opposed the appeals, maintaining that the testimony was consistent on material aspects.