New Delhi, Sep 26 A Delhi court on Saturday deferred its hearing on the appeal filed by four women wrestlers against a magistrate’s verdict acquitting former Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh in a sexual harassment case.
The criminal appeal filed on Friday also assailed the acquittal of former WFI assistant secretary Vinod Tomar of the criminal intimidation charge in the case.
On Saturday, the court staff of Special Judge Dig Vinay Singh announced that the judge was on leave for judicial training, and that the matter would be taken up on Monday.
On August 3 this year, the magisterial court acquitted former BJP MP and former WFI chief Brij Bhushan Singh in a sexual harassment case filed by six women wrestlers, including world championships medallist Vinesh Phogat, citing lack of evidence.
The court also acquitted Tomar.
According to wrestlers’ plea filed on Friday, the acquittal was unsustainable in law, was founded on a “manifestly erroneous and selective appreciation” of the evidence on record, proceeded on conjectures and surmises, and failed to apply binding and well-settled principles of law.
The plea claimed that a major portion of the magisterial court’s judgment rested its reasoning on archaic and stereotypical assumptions about the expected behaviour of victims of sexual assault and harassment, instead of a fair and evidence-based assessment after taking into account the victims’ circumstances.
(PTI News)
