Consent for indulging in unnatural sex 'immaterial': Court

Consent to indulge in unnatural sex is "immaterial", a Delhi court has held while convicting a man of raping and committing unnatural act with a woman on the false promise of marriage, despite he being already married.
Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Virender Bhat held Noida resident Prashant Kaushal guilty of the offences saying though the sexual relations between him and the woman were consensual but the victim's consent was not free and voluntary as she was falsely assured by him that he was obtaining divorce from his wife and would marry her.
"The consent is immaterial so far as carnal intercourse against the order of nature between a man and a woman is concerned and therefore, every act of unnatural sex committed by the accused with the prosecutrix is an offence under section 377 (unnatural offences) of the IPC," the court said.

The court, which is yet to pronounce order on quantum of sentence, agreed with the submissions of the defence counsel that instances of physical relations between Kaushal and the woman could not have been forcible all the time.
It, however, said that it does appear that the woman was having sexual encounters with the man voluntarily but having belief in her mind that he has filed petition for divorce against his wife and is going to marry her at any cost.
The court said it was not only the man but his parents also who deceived the woman and persuaded her to continue sexual relations with their son on the promise that he would marry her after he gets divorced from his wife.

"Kaushal also used to force her to consume alcohol before engaging in sex with her in order to ensure that she does not offer much resistance and he gets more pleasure and satisfaction from it," the court noted, adding her consent was not free and voluntary.

According to the prosecution, Kaushal and the woman were working in the same office in Gurgaon and they became friends and used to go for outing. When she fell ill, the man came to his house and raped her and on her resistance, he assured her that he would marry her.
It said the man took the woman to several places outside Delhi since 2012 to 2014 and after making her consume alcohol, he forcibly established physical relations including unnatural with her.

It added that the woman took transfer to Hyderabad where the man followed on one pretext or other and later on she quit her job.