Supreme Court sets aside Allahabad High Court ruling on attempt to rape

The Supreme Court on Tuesday overturned a controversial March 2025 ruling of the Allahabad High Court, which had held that grabbing a minor girl’s breasts and dragging her beneath a culvert did not amount to an attempt to rape.

Describing the decision as the result of a “patently erroneous application of the settled principles of criminal jurisprudence”, the apex court restored charges of attempt to rape under Section 376 read with Section 511 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 18 of the POCSO Act. The bench clarified that its observations were prima facie and would not influence the ongoing trial before the special POCSO court in Kasganj.

The ruling was delivered by a bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, alongside Justices Joymalya Bagchi and N V Anjaria. The court found that the high court had incorrectly reduced the charges to lesser offences on the ground that the accused had only “prepared” to commit rape and had not reached the stage of “attempt”.

Rejecting this reasoning, the Supreme Court reiterated the settled legal distinction between preparation and attempt, observing that an attempt begins when intention (mens rea) is put into action. Referring to the allegations on record, the bench noted that the accused had taken the minor on a motorcycle on the pretext of dropping her home, stopped near a culvert, dragged her and committed sexually offensive acts, fleeing only after she screamed and drew attention.

“A bare perusal of these allegations leaves no modicum of doubt” that the accused had moved beyond preparation and had begun executing the intent to commit rape, the court said, holding that a prima facie case was clearly established.

The proceedings were initiated suo motu after senior advocate Shobha Gupta, founder of the NGO “We the Women of India”, wrote to the then Chief Justice highlighting what she termed legally flawed and insensitive reasoning in the high court’s order. The Supreme Court had earlier stayed the impugned observations as “insensitive and inhuman” and, in December 2025, stayed the entire judgment.

Beyond correcting the legal error, the bench turned its attention to what it described as a broader systemic concern: the lack of empathy and sensitivity in certain judicial pronouncements dealing with sexual offences, particularly those involving minors and vulnerable victims.

Emphasising that courts must combine sound legal reasoning with compassion, the bench said the absence of either would undermine justice. It noted that previous efforts to address this issue had not yielded the desired results.

In response, the court requested the National Judicial Academy in Bhopal to constitute a five-member expert committee to frame comprehensive guidelines aimed at fostering sensitivity and compassion in the handling of sexual offence cases and other matters involving vulnerable individuals.

The committee will be chaired by former Supreme Court judge Aniruddha Bose, who currently serves as Director of the academy. It has been tasked with preparing a report titled “Developing Guidelines to Inculcate Sensitivity and Compassion into Judges and Judicial Processes in the Context of Sexual Offences and other Vulnerable Cases” within three months.

The court directed that the proposed guidelines be drafted in clear and accessible language, avoiding complex terminology or foreign legal expressions, and be tailored to Indian realities. The panel may consult linguists, prosecutors, social scientists, counsellors and other experts before submitting its report to the Chief Justice for administrative consideration.

The move follows recent remarks by the Chief Justice criticising earlier initiatives, including a 2023 handbook on combating gender stereotypes, as overly technical and insufficiently accessible to ordinary citizens.

With its latest order, the Supreme Court has not only reinstated the original charges in the case but also signalled a broader push to reform judicial discourse and practice in cases involving sexual violence.

With agency input