SC must take serious note of Allahabad HC ruling: UnionMin

Union women and child development minister Annapurna Devi on Friday expressed concern over the Allahabad High Court's ruling, which held that actions like grabbing breasts or snapping a pyjama string do not constitute rape or an attempt to rape but rather fall under the lesser charge of aggravated sexual assault. She said the Supreme Court should intervene in the matter.

Speaking to reporters outside the Lok Sabha, Devi said she "completely disagreed" with the verdict and called for the Supreme Court to take cognizance of the matter.

"I am completely against this decision and the Supreme Court should take serious note of it. Such a ruling has no place in a civilised society," she told PTI.


She expressed concern over the broader implications of the judgement, warning it could send a wrong message to society. "Somewhere, this will have a negative impact on society, and we will discuss this matter further," she added.

The case involved a minor girl in a district of Uttar Pradesh who was allegedly attacked in 2021 by two men -- Pawan and Akash. The allegation against the accused, Pawan and Akash, is that they grabbed the breasts of the victim and Akash tried to bring down the lower garment of the victim and for that purpose they had broken the string of her lower garments and tried to drag her beneath the culvert. But, due to intervention of witnesses, they left the victim and fled from the place of the incident.

As per the court order, this fact is not sufficient to draw an inference that the accused persons had determined to commit rape on the victim as, apart from these facts, no other act is attributed to them to further their alleged desire to commit rape.

In this case, the judgement was delivered by justice Ram Manohar Narayan Mishra on March 17. The judge ruled in favour of the two men, who challenged the decision by the lower court to summon them under charges of rape.