The Delhi High Court has quashed a Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act case following the victim’s request. The court asked the accused to perform community service at a government hospital for a month and deposit ₹50,000 towards the Army Battle Casualties Welfare Fund.
2019 case
The accused had been booked in an FIR registered in 2019 on IPC sections pertaining to voyeurism, assault on a woman with intent to outrage her modesty, criminal intimidation, and sexual harassment, among others, apart from the relevant sections of the POCSO Act.
In her complaint, the minor girl said the accused had pressured her into sharing intimate photographs.
After communication between the two ceased, the accused allegedly threatened to share her photos online and demanded ₹6,000 from her in February 2018. The victim said she “made several payments under duress”, and later, a friend of the accused also blackmailed her for money.
In his May 27 order, Justice Sanjeev Narula stated that the allegations were “undoubtedly serious”, involving charges of harassment and exploitation of a minor girl, which disclosed “a pattern emblematic of the darker undercurrents of the social media age, where technology is misused to exert control, induce fear, and compromise dignity”.
Ordinarily, such allegations, he added, would not merit quashing of the FIR, but it considered the victim’s “desire to move on from this chapter”. The court then ordered the quashing of the FIR, based on the accused’s undertaking that he had not retained the photographs.
It directed the accused to perform a month of community service at Lok Nayak Hospital.
Published – June 04, 2025 01:33 am IST