New Delhi: A Delhi court Wednesday convicted Lalit D’Silva, a former Regional Manager (India) of SriLankan Airlines. He had been accused of outraging the modesty of one of his colleague at its Delhi division office in 2009. Metropolitan Magistrate Dev Saroha pronounced the judgement through video conferencing. He posted the matter for hearing on the quantum of sentence November 17 for Lalit D’Silva.
The court said ‘It is proved beyond reasonable doubt that accused with intention to outrage the modesty of the complainant uttered the above mentioned words, as such he is liable to be convicted under section 509 of IPC’. The maximum punishment for the offence is three years jail term.
The judge said that the victim was working as a sales executive at SriLankan Airlines, Delhi Office, was thoroughly consistent in her statement regarding the date on which the incident happened and how it happened, from her statement given to police. Her statement under section 164 CrPC (recorded before a magistrate) and her statement made before the Court while undergoing her examination were consistent. The judge further noted that D’Silva was given opportunity to cross examine the complainant. Even after a lengthy cross examination she was able to stand her ground.
According to the prosecution, on October 8, 2009 the accused called the complainant in his room. D’Silva outraged her modesty by asking inappropriate questions.
The accused had defended himself by submitting that he has been falsely implicated in the case by the complainant. This was done when she failed to get herself transferred back to Delhi Station from Cochin where she was transferred by the company. D’Silva said there was a delay in filing the FIR which shows that the case is false.
