New Delhi, Sept. 3 -- Observing that a four-and-a-half-year-old child cannot be expected to describe a sexual assault using "technical, legal or medical terminology", the Delhi High Court has overturned the acquittal of a man in a 2008 rape case, holding that the trial court adopted an unduly narrow approach by insisting on an express assertion of "penetration" by the child victim.

A division bench of Justice Navin Chawla and Justice Ravinder Dudeja said the testimony of a child witness must be assessed in its substance and in the context of the child's age, trauma and natural manner of narration, rather than on whether she used precise anatomical or legal language.

"The Court must remain sensitive to the fact that a child of four years...