THANJAVUR: The district additional sessions court here on Friday sentenced a drawing master of a school at Mayiladuthurai in Nagapattinam district to three years imprisonment for using his cell phone camera to video-graph a Dalit girl taking bath. The Judge, S. Karthikeyan, convicting the drawing master, K. Balamurugan, 34, said the accused should undergo one year imprisonment each under IPC section 354(c) (punishment for watching and taking pictures of the private act of a girl without her knowledge), section 66(E) of the IT Act (punishment for violation of privacy) and three years imprisonment under section 3(1) (II) of Prevention of Atrocities against SC/ST Act, as the victim is an Adhidravida girl, -all the sentences to run concurrently.
According to the police, Balamurugan, a drawing master in a school at Mayiladuthurai in Nagapattinam district, had a shop in front of his house. He used to indulge in sexual banter with a Dalit girl who used to come to his shop for purchases. On April 13, 2015, when the girl was taking bath in her house, she found a cell phone in her bathing place. She found in those videos of her taking bath. The cell phone belonged to Balamurugan and it was found that he used it to take the video, the prosecution said.
