(UNI) A sessions court has recently sentenced a 50-year-old to life imprisonment and also imposed a fine of around Rs 1.30 lakh for repeatedly raping an acting aspirant here.
The victim, a 25-year-old married woman, came in contact with the 50-year-old Ravindranath Ghosh through a friend to whom he had told that he was a casting director and had contacts in the film industry.
Calling her to meet him at a lodge in Madh Island, Malad, where Ghosh repeatedly established sexual relations with her. Again, these times, he had clicked her nude photos with which he had continued to threaten her to continue the sexual favours.
The incidents had taken place over a few months in 2012 and the complaint was register the case two years later.
The man was found guilty of rape, extortion, criminal intimidation, outraging modesty of a woman and under a section of the Information Technology Act pertaining to capturing, transmitting or publishing image of private area of a person.
Under the IT Act he was ordered to pay a fine of Rs 1 lakh, which the court has directed to be paid to the survivor as compensation. Additionally, he was also ordered to pay a fine of Rs 25,000 for rape under IPC.
During trial, the woman told court that her husband had deserted her and her baby girl and filed for divorce due to the incident. Of the witnesses who had deposed were the lodge manager where Ghosh had committed the sexual assaults and her employer to whom he had sent the nude pictures.
Additional Sessions Judge AD Deo observed that ‘respect for womanhood in our country is on the decline and cases of molestation and rape are steadily growing…the standard of proof to be expected by the court in such cases must take into account the fact that such crimes are generally committed on the sly and very rarely direct
evidence of a person other than the prosecutrix is available.