GUWAHATI: The Gauhati High Court has acquitted a man convicted of raping a 24-year-old woman with intellectual disability, holding that the prosecution failed to provide specific expert evidence showing that her condition prevented her from understanding the nature of sexual intercourse or giving valid consent.
The court also held that the woman’s statement recorded under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) could not be treated as her examination-in-chief because mandatory safeguards applicable to statements by mentally disabled victims had not been followed.
Justice Sanjeev Kumar Sharma allowed the appeal filed by P. Rohmingsanga and set aside the June 18, 2024, judgment of the Sessions Court, Lunglei Judicial District, which had convicted him under Section 376(2)(l) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and sentenced him to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment and a fine of ₹3,000.
The High Court held that the mere existence of intellectual disability could not establish that an adult woman lacked the capacity to understand a sexual act or give valid consent. The question, it said, had to be determined on the basis of evidence concerning the woman’s actual capacity rather than disability percentages or psychological scores alone.
“A 24 year old woman assessed to have a mental age of 8/9 years cannot be straightaway equated with an actual 8/9 years old girl,” the court observed.
Prosecution relied on disability certificates
The case concerned an alleged incident of sexual intercourse between Rohmingsanga and the woman on May 9, 2022, at a shop near her residence.
According to the prosecution, the woman’s mother learned of the alleged incident through her niece and subsequently questioned her daughter. The woman allegedly told her mother that Rohmingsanga had come to the shop between 11am and noon and had sexual intercourse with her. She also allegedly referred to two earlier incidents involving the accused.
The matter was not immediately reported to police. The prosecution said the accused’s ordination as a Church Elder was later revoked by the Baptist Church Mission of Electric ‘North’, Hnahthial. The family did not lodge an FIR at that stage.
The complainant subsequently received a legal notice from the accused through his advocate. She then approached police, following which an FIR was registered on July 22, 2022, under Section 376(2)(l) IPC.
During the trial, the prosecution examined seven witnesses. The Sessions Court convicted the accused and sentenced him to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment.
The prosecution relied on two disability certificates, both recording 40% mental disability. One had been issued in 2009 and the other in 2021.
A clinical psychologist, Jacob Challiandinga, assessed the woman on April 23, 2024. The assessment recorded a mental age of eight years and eight months, an IQ of 63 and a social age of nine years. His final impression was mild intellectual disability with 50% disability.
However, the High Court found that the prosecution had not produced evidence specifically addressing whether the woman’s condition prevented her from understanding sexual intercourse or giving valid consent.
The doctors or authorities who issued the earlier disability certificates were not examined regarding the implications of the recorded disability. The clinical psychologist who conducted the later assessment also did not give an opinion on the woman’s capacity to understand the sexual act.
The court also noted that the psychological assessment had been conducted nearly two years after the alleged incident.
Accused admitted intercourse, claimed it was consensual
Rohmingsanga did not completely deny having sexual intercourse with the woman. His defence was that the intercourse had occurred on one occasion and was consensual.
His counsel argued that the woman was 24 years old at the relevant time and had 24 years of lived experience as an adult. She ran a small shop and had studied up to Class XII under the disabled quota.
The defence argued that her intellectual disability could not automatically be treated as proof that she was incapable of understanding the nature of the act.
The prosecution, however, maintained that her mental disability rendered her incapable of giving valid consent and that the accused’s admitted sexual intercourse therefore amounted to rape.
Court rejects mental-age equivalence
The High Court cautioned against treating an assessed “mental age” as equivalent to the chronological age of a child.
The Bench noted that the woman was a 24-year-old adult with 24 years of lived experience, physical development and exposure to the adult social environment.
The court stressed that sexual autonomy could not be taken away merely on the basis of psychological scores.
“Such right of the individual cannot be stripped away merely on vague presumptions based on some abstract scores or numbers generated by psychological tests,” the court said.
It held that the prosecution was required to produce specific expert evidence demonstrating that the woman’s intellectual disability actually prevented her from understanding the nature and consequences of the sexual act.
Section 164 statement not recorded with safeguards
The court also examined how the woman’s statement under Section 164 CrPC had been recorded.
When she appeared before the trial court on April 24, 2023, the court read out her earlier Section 164 statement. She accepted it as correct and true, after which cross-examination began.
However, no separate examination-in-chief was recorded.
The High Court found that the trial court had apparently treated the Section 164 statement as the woman’s examination-in-chief under Section 164(5A)(b) CrPC.
The provision contains special safeguards for recording statements of persons with temporary or permanent mental or physical disabilities. These include assistance from an interpreter or special educator and videography of the statement.
The High Court noted that neither safeguard had been followed.
“If the statement of the victim is to be regarded as one under sub-section 5 A of Section 164 CrPC, the condition stipulated in the provisions thereto must be strictly followed,” the Bench held.
Court finds no substantive evidence establishing lack of consent
The High Court held that the failure to follow the statutory safeguards meant that the woman’s Section 164 statement could not be treated as her examination-in-chief.
“There is no substantive evidence of the victim herself on record, either by way of examination-in-chief or a prior statement admissible under Section 164 (5A)(a)(b) CrPC in lieu of examination-in-chief,” the court said.
The court consequently found that the prosecution had failed to establish absence of consent through substantive evidence from the woman herself.
It also rejected the prosecution’s reliance on Section 114A of the Evidence Act, which provides for a presumption regarding absence of consent in specified rape cases.
The court held that the statutory presumption could not be invoked because the woman had not given examination-in-chief stating that she had not consented, while her Section 164 statement could not be treated as evidence in lieu of examination-in-chief.
“Consequently, Section 114A of the Evidence Act has no application herein,” the Bench held.
The court also considered evidence concerning the other alleged incidents. It noted that the woman’s mother had acknowledged that the earlier incidents had not been disclosed to the family before the third incident.
The Bench further considered the woman’s statements about visiting the accused’s house and the school where he worked after he called her. In the absence of evidence establishing mental incapacity, the court found these circumstances relevant to its assessment of consent.
Supreme Court precedent distinguished
The prosecution had relied on the Supreme Court’s judgment in Chamanlal v. State of Himachal Pradesh, decided in 2020, in which a rape conviction involving a woman with intellectual disability had been upheld.
The Gauhati High Court distinguished that case, noting that the Supreme Court had before it specific medical evidence from doctors who had examined the victim and concluded that her intellectual condition prevented her from understanding the nature of the sexual assault.
In the present case, the doctors who issued the earlier disability certificates had not been examined about the implications of the woman’s condition. The clinical psychologist who assessed her in 2024 had also not provided an opinion on whether she was capable of understanding the sexual act.
The High Court therefore concluded that the prosecution had failed to prove the charge through legally admissible evidence.
“The case of the prosecution has not been proved by the legally admissible evidence and hence the impugned Judgment & Sentence cannot be sustained,” the court held.
The High Court accordingly allowed the appeal, set aside the Sessions Court’s conviction and sentence, and directed that P. Rohmingsanga be released forthwith.
