Setting aside the conviction of a 23-year-old man, who was accused of raping his neighbour, the Delhi High Court has held that consent for physical relations by a grown woman was “an act of promiscuity on her part and not an act induced by misconception of fact”. The woman, a 32-year-old widow with three children, had filed a complaint in 2012 alleging that her neighbour, a taxi driver, had established physical relations with her for several months after promising to marry her. [related-post] They established physical relations and continued to do so for some months. He later started “avoiding” her and did not inform his parents about wanting to marry her, she alleged. The High Court bench of Justice SP Garg, however, held that the woman was “mature enough” to fully understand what was happening. “There is nothing in her evidence to demonstrate that she was incapable of understanding the nature and implications of the act which she consented to,” it said.
