Sri Lanka, Nov. 7 -- In a rare move that prioritises an offender's reformation and rehabilitation over a lengthy custodial sentence, the Court of Appeal has reduced a 10-year rigorous imprisonment sentence imposed on a young man convicted of raping his girlfriend when she was under 15 years of age to two years, taking into consideration that he was only 19 at the time of the offence and is now a married father of a young child.

A two-judge Bench comprising Justices P. Kumararatnam and Pradeep Hettiarachchi held that the circumstances of the case warranted an approach focusing on the offender's reformation and rehabilitation rather than a lengthy custodial sentence.

The Court observed that the accused, who had just attained adulthood ...