A child born out of rape is entitled to compensation, in addition to any provisions granted to the woman raped, the Delhi High Court ruled on Tuesday. The decision was made during the hearing of a case in which a man was sentenced to life for raping his minor stepdaughter. As a result of the assault, the girl gave birth to a child at the age of 14, PTI reported.

A child born out of rape is “clearly a victim of the act of the offender and entitled to compensation”, the bench of justices Gita Mittal and RK Gauba said. This was a case where the “trust and confidence reposed in the man by his wife and stepdaughter was abused by him to bring about untold miseries on the body, mind and psyche of the child”, the bench observed.

The court also ruled that there was no relief for the child born out of the rape under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act or the Delhi government’s victim compensation scheme. The high court had earlier reduced the compensation awarded by a trial court from Rs 15 lakh to Rs 7.5 lakh, saying that the earlier figure did not comply with the 2011 compensation scheme.