A special fast track court here on Tuesday sentenced a 65-year-old man to seven-years in jail for sexually assaulting his neighbour’s four-year-old child in 2021.
Fast Track Special Court judge R Rekha sentenced Thiruvananthapuram resident Muraleedharan to seven years of rigorous imprisonment and also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on him in the case.
The mother of the child had turned hostile during the trial in the case.
The court invoked section 154 of the Indian Evidence Act, and permitted the prosecution to cross-examine the child who had also changed her statement once during the trial.
“The evidence of a child witness and credibility thereof would depend upon the circumstances of each case. The only precaution which the court should bear in mind while assessing the evidence of a child witness is that the witness must be a reliable one and his/her demeanour must be like any other competent witness and there is no likelihood of being tutored,” the court observed in its order.
According to the prosecution, the accused committed the crime on July 21, 2021 when the mother entrusted her daughter to him, who was her neighbour, when she had to go to the police station after the child’s father was taken into custody in another case.
Special Public Prosecutor R S Vijaya Mohan said that Kudumbashree workers saw the man molesting the child, from an open door of the house, and alerted the local residents and informed the police.
The prosecution examined 16 witnesses, produced 25 documents and two items of material evidence before the court.
