The Supreme Court on 29.08.2018, in DOLA @ DOLAGOBINDA PRADHAN & ANR v THE STATE OF ODISHA , quashed the decision of the High Court of Orissa at Cuttack and order of the Assistant Sessions Judge, which had previously convicted the appellants in its judgement followed by ten years of rigorous imprisonment for raping the victim under the Indian Penal Code.

As per the prosecution’s version the facts wheeled around, were that the victim was raped by the appellants accompanied by threat to life in case she had tried to raise an alarm. After the incident, the victim along with her husband filed an FIR where the trial court passed a judgement on conviction against the accused, which was similarly followed by the High Court in its decision.

The contentions raised by the appellant’s side were that testimony of the victim were false, misleading and having an ulterior motive to seek revenge from the appellants by concocting a story of rape. It was further alleged that the victim’s testimony during the examination in-chief with that of the cross examination were different that raised serious speculations upon the genuineness of the incident.

Further, it was found that the medical examination did not tend to support the version of the prosecution based on several grounds such as the injuries sustained, the shapes of injuries, the semen and saliva of the accused and the husband were not suitable for serological examination followed by various other justifications. The husband too, in his cross examination and chief examination had two different versions with regard to the narration of the incident especially with the time when the FIR was lodged.

Hence, after considering the facts and circumstances of the case, the Apex Court held that lower court and the High Court have committed error by ignoring the above mentioned and other relevant factors, the FIR lodged was false in order to seek vengeance from the appellants in connection with a theft of forest produce by the prosecutrix and her husband.
Hence, the appeal was granted while the order of the trial court and High Court were set aside and the accused were set free.

[1] https://www.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2017/25787/25787_2017_Judgement_29-Aug-2018.pdf