3 min readJammuMay 24, 2026 07:29 AM IST
The Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh High Court has expressed astonishment at the “slipshod” investigation into the alleged rape of a minor and directed the police to constitute a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to identify the culprit. The order came after DNA tests ruled out the suspect as the father of a child born to the survivor.
In its eight-page order on Friday, Justice Rajnesh Oswal directed that an SIT, headed by an officer not below the rank of Superintendent of Police, be constituted within seven days. The court also sought a compliance report by June 29 and directed the Sessions Judge to return the chargesheet to the SHO for further investigation.
The court, however, dismissed a petition seeking the quashing of the FIR against the suspect.
The allegations pertain to the rape of a minor between 2021 and 2022, which resulted in the birth of a baby girl. According to the court order, the survivor’s parents worked for the suspect’s family. When they passed away, the victim and her elder sister continued living with the suspect’s family since they had no other place to go.
In February 2022, the minor gave birth to a baby girl, leading to a case under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. The baby died of alleged dehydration in July 2022, following which her DNA samples were collected and preserved at the Forensic Science Laboratory, Srinagar.
Nearly two years later, on February 11, 2024, the suspect was arrested based on the victim’s complaint, though a subsequent DNA test ruled out his paternity. A chargesheet was also filed against him.
In his petition, the suspect denied the allegations and accused the victim’s grandfather of “wielding his influence to shift the blame”. To support his claim, he cited the DNA findings. The court, too, questioned how the chargesheet was filed despite the DNA results.
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“This court cannot but express its astonishment at the slipshod manner in which the investigation was pursued,’’ observed Justice Rajnesh Oswal. “Despite conclusive scientific evidence demonstrating that the petitioner (the suspect) could not have fathered the child, the Investigating Officer failed entirely to take measures to unearth the identity of the actual perpetrator. It behoved the Investigating Officer to probe the matter further, so that the true paternity of the child might be established.”
Since it had been established that the petitioner did not father the child, the identity of the actual perpetrator remained “shrouded in mystery”, the court observed.
“It is evident that the Investigating Officer filed the chargesheet with undue haste, seemingly for the sole purpose of precluding the petitioner from obtaining default bail. Be that as it may, the exceptional nature of this case precludes this court from remaining a passive onlooker to the flawed manner of the investigation. If this court does not exercise its jurisdiction to remedy this failure, the true culprit will escape unpunished and successfully elude the process of law,” the court said.
