IMPORTANT POINT
Cruelty and dowry offence – Court must guard against false implication of relatives of husband in such cases.

JUDGMENT :

PRASHANT KUMAR MISHRA, J.

Leave granted.

2. In the present appeal the appellants have challenged the order passed by the High Court whereby their petition under Section 482 Cr.P.C for quashing proceedings in C.C. No. 359 of 2016 on the file of the Special Judicial Magistrate, Ist Class for Prohibition & Excise Cases, Guntur was dismissed.

3. The appellant No.1 (A4) is the sister-in-law of the de-facto complainant, appellant No. 2 (A5) is the husband of A4 and appellant No. 3 (A6) is the father-in-law of appellant No. 1 (A4).

4. The marriage between de-facto complainant (respondent no. 2) with Challa Poornananda Reddy (A1) was solemnised on 24.05.2014 at Guntur. After five months of the marriage, the de-facto complainant left the company of her husband and joined her parents to live at her parental house at Vidyanagar, Guntur. On persuasion, she joined her husband but again went back to her parental house and this act continued for some more time compelling the husband to send a legal notice followed by a petition for restitution of conjugal rights on 18.02.2015. During the pendency of this proceeding, she lodged a complaint before the concerned police on 13.02.2016. However, on intervention of elders a compromise was arrived at on 02.04.2015 and the husband (A1) withdrew the case of restitution of conjugal rights and the de-facto complainant also withdrew her complaint before the concerned police.

5. She later left for USA without intimating the husband or his family members and the dispute continued. The husband moved a petition for dissolution of marriage on 21.06.2016 and as a counterblast she again lodged a police complaint bearing FIR No. 79 of 2016 against six accused persons including the present appellants.

6. It is the case of the appellants that they are nowhere connected with the dispute between the husband and the wife or the husband’s family members. The appellants are residing at Hyderabad. On the complaint of the father of the respondent no. 2 (de–facto complainant) an offence under Section 66C of the Information Technology Act was registered against the husband (A1) which is pending as CC No. 775 of 2016 before the learned Special Judicial First-Class Magistrate for Prohibition and Excise, Gunturu, Andhra Pradesh. It is further case of the appellants that accused no. 4 is a housewife, accused no. 5 is a Software Engineer in a Private Software Company and accused no. 6 is a Central Government employee and all are stationed at Hyderabad having no connection or intervention with the dispute between the de-facto complainant and her husband.

7. The High Court refused to allow the quashing petition on the ground that there are allegations against the appellants for which a trial is required and the same cannot be disbelieved at this stage.

8. Having heard learned counsel for the parties and on perusal of record it appears that there are omnibus and general allegations against the appellants. As per complaint, although, they reside at Hyderabad, they used to visit Guntur and during such visit they used to instigate accused no. 1/husband and his parents and would also join in demanding dowry. The initial allegation is of demand of Rs. 5,00,000/- made against accused No. 4/appellant no. 1 with further statement that they used to taunt that if accused no. 1 would have married somewhere else, he would have got Rs. 10 crores dowry. There is no allegation of any physical torture being perpetrated by the present appellants. The allegation is only of taunt and statement that they are highly placed having political influence and connection with Ministers as such they instigated accused no. 1 to accused no. 3 to pressurise the de-facto complainant to get additional dowry.

9. There is no denial of the fact that the appellants reside at Hyderabad whereas the de-facto complainant stayed at Guntur in her marital house. There is no specific date as to when the present appellants visited Guntur and joined accused nos. 1 to 3 in dema