In Brief
In 2019, a man sexually assaulted a five-year-old child in Chhattisgarh. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, but the sentence imposed was "imprisonment for the remainder of natural life"—a definition introduced by an amendment that came into effect after his crime. The Supreme Court upheld his conviction but modified the sentence to ordinary life imprisonment under the law existing when the crime occurred, because retrospectively applying harsher penalties violates Article 20(1) of the Constitution.
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