Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 – s.6 (as amended) – Punishment for aggravated penetrative sexual assault – Retrospective application of the amended provision-s.6, to the incident took place prior to the amendment – Propriety – Commission of offence by the appellant on 20.05.2019 – Amended provision of s.6 POCSO Act, came into force on 16.08.2019 whereby the minimum sentence enhanced to 20 years and redefined “imprisonment for life” to mean imprisonment for the remainder of the natural life – Courts below convicted the appellant u/s.376AB IPC and s.6 POCSO Act and sentenced him to imprisonment for remainder of his natural life, along with a fine – Correctness: Held: Constitutional bar against retrospective imposition of a harsher penalty u/Art.20(1) is clear and absolute – Since the offence was committed on 20.05.2019, the amended provision of s.6 POCSO Act, which came into force on 16.08.2019, could not have been applied to the instant case – Trial court, in applying the enhanced sentence introduced by the 2019 Amendment to s.6 POCSO Act, effectively subjected the appellant to a punishment greater than that which was permissible under the law in force at the time of commission of the offence which is clearly violative of the bar contained in Art.20(1) – Sentence of “imprisonment for life, meaning remainder of natural life,” as per the amended provision, did not exist on the date of the incident – Under the unamended s.6, the maximum punishment permissible was imprisonment for life in its conventional sense and not imprisonment till the remainder of natural life – Conviction of the appellant u/s.6 POCSO Act upheld, however, sentence is modified to that of rigorous imprisonment for life, as given under the unamended statute, and set aside the sentence of imprisonment for the remainder of the natural life – Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act, 2019 – Constitution of India – Art.20(1) – Penal Code, 1860 – s.376AB. [Paras 9-13]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Nidhi Jain. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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