The Delhi High Court has said that “mere friendship” doesn’t give a man the right to establish sexual relations with a minor girl.

Justice Girish Kathpalia made the remark while rejecting the claim of an accused of having entered into a consensual relationship with a girl, pointing out that “consent is not lawful” when it comes to a minor.

“Merely because a girl befriends a boy, the latter cannot be given liberty to indulge in sexual intercourse with or without her consent. Further, even a consent would not be lawful in the present case because the prosecutrix was a minor,” the court said in an order on Thursday.

The court underlined the girl’s specific allegations in the FIR and her testimony about the man’s repeated sexual assault despite her protestations.

“I am unable to find it a case of consensual relations merely because in the FIR the prosecutrix stated that the accused/applicant with his sweet talk befriended her,” the court said adding that it was “not a fit case to grant bail to the accused”.

The prosecution said in April 2023, the man, working as a construction labourer in Vikaspuri, Delhi, befriended the minor and raped her subsequently. The girl was threatened and the man continued to rape her till November 2023, it said.

The accused, on the other hand, claimed the girl was a major at the time of the incident and he had consensual sex with her.

The court considered the girls’ educational records establishing her age as a minor.