The Delhi High Court has suspended the life sentence awarded to former legislator Kuldeep Singh Sengar in the Unnao rape case, resting its decision on a narrow but decisive legal question: whether Sengar could be treated as a “public servant” for the purpose of imposing the harshest punishment under child protection law.
At the interim stage, the Court found that he could not.
The suspension of sentence follows the Court’s prima facie view that the offence could not be classified as aggravated penetrative sexual assault under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. That classification is crucial, because it is what triggered a mandatory minimum of 20 years’ imprisonment—extendable to life—when the trial court sentenced Sengar.
Under Section 5 of the POCSO Act, a sexual offence against a child becomes “aggravated” only in specific situations: when committed by a public servant, police personnel, armed forces member, jail or hospital staff, or by someone who holds a legally recognised position of trust or authority over the child.
The High Court held that Sengar does not fit into any of these statutory categories.
In particular, the Bench ruled that a legislator cannot automatically be branded a “public servant” for the purposes of Section 5(c) of the POCSO Act or the corresponding aggravated offence under the Indian Penal Code. Nor, the Court said, could he be placed within the residual category of a person occupying a “position of trust or authority” under Section 5(p) of the POCSO Act.
As a result, the Court concluded that the aggravated offence provision—carrying punishment for the remainder of a person’s natural life—was not attracted at this stage of the appeal.
That conclusion dramatically altered the sentencing landscape. Without the aggravated charge, the applicable offence falls under Section 3 of the POCSO Act, punishable under Section 4, which prescribes a minimum of seven years’ imprisonment (as it stood prior to the 2019 amendment).
Sengar has already spent more than seven years in custody.
Taking note of this, the Court observed that since the minimum statutory punishment had already been served, and since the aggravated offence was not made out on a prima facie reading, there were sufficient grounds to suspend the sentence while the appeal against conviction remains pending.
The observations were made while deciding Sengar’s application seeking suspension of sentence during the hearing of his appeal against the trial court’s verdict, which had sentenced him to life imprisonment by treating him as a public servant who had betrayed public trust.
The underlying case relates to allegations that a minor girl was abducted and sexually assaulted over several days in 2017, later sold for money, and subsequently recovered. Proceedings in the matter were later shifted to Delhi on the direction of the Supreme Court, leading to Sengar’s conviction and life sentence by the trial court.
The High Court’s order does not decide the appeal on merits. It limits itself to whether the sentence should remain in force while the appeal is heard—leaving the final determination of guilt and punishment to be settled later.
