Baripada, May 16 (PTI) A man was sentenced to 20 years in jail by a court in Odisha's Mayurbhanj district for raping a teenage girl when she went out to relieve herself.

POCSO court judge Pratima Patro also imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 on the convict, who is 30.

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The 14-year-old girl was raped on January 16, 2022, when she went to a forest near her house to relieve herself, Special Public Prosecutor Abhinna Kumar Pattnaik said.

The accused was arrested on the basis of a complaint lodged by the girl's father at the Jashipur police station and charged under various sections of the IPC and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.

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The court directed the district legal services authority to pay Rs 7 lakh in compensation to the girl.

The verdict was based on the statement of the victim, 14 witnesses and her medical report.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)