'No Means May be' are Old Tricks, Stage of Consent Crucial: High Court on Woman's Reaction to Abuse

There cannot be a straight-jacket formula as to how a woman would react to an act of outrage by a man, but incarcerating a young person indefinitely would bean antithesis to the concept of liberty, the Bombay HC has noted. The remark was made by Justice Bharti Dangre on July 21 while granting bail to a 24-year-old man accused in a rape & molestation case.

The accused was arrested in Dec 2019 & has been in jail since then. As per the court, the case was registered in Nov 2019 after a 25-year-old woman alleged that she was raped & molested by the accused on Oct 28, 2019 at Aamby Valley in Lonavala, a hill station around 120km from here.

According to the victim, she was acquainted with the accused for the last eight years & that they had gone to Aamby Valley to celebrate Diwali along with some friends.

After returning from her trip, the woman told her mother about the incident, following which they approached the police station concerned in Pune & registered an First Information Report (FIR) on Nov 8. While seeking bail, the accused's advocate Abhinav Chandrachud argued that there had been an unexplained delay in registering the FIR.

The court, in its order, noted that the victim claimed to have raised an alarm to stop the accused from molesting her & it was astonishing that despite being in the same bungalow, none of her friends came to her rescue.

The reason for she not disclosing the offensive conduct of the applicant, which was so dreadful, horrific & appalling, according to her, is something incomprehensible, the court said.

The court, after perusing the material submitted by the prosecution & the charge sheet, observed that it does not constitute a reasonable ground to believe that the applicant is guilty of the offence.

There cannot be a straight-jacket formula about how a woman would react to an act of outrage by a man, since all women are born into different circumstances in life, go through different things & face, experience & react differently, Justice Dangre observed.

"The concept of consent of the victim or as to at what stage the consent was revoked & the act of physical indulgence was attempted to be restrained is a matter of trial," the court said. "The long-lived notion, as expressed by Warren Buffet 'If a lady says No, she means may be' are old hat tricks & the issue as to whether the girl really consented freely for a physical indulgence with her is to be searched by applying the new standards of modern life & the present social scenario," she said.

The court noted that the accused was a graduate in mechanical engineering & had no criminal antecedents. Incarceration of a young man for an indefinite period would be antithesis to the concept of liberty, the court said & granted him bail on a personal bond of Rs 50,000.

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