General allegations against in-laws under Section 498A without specific incidents do not warrant prosecution, highlighting issues of misuse in matrimonial disputes.

ORDER :

T.M. NADAF, J.

This petition is filed by petitioners/accused Nos.2 and 3 seeking to quash the proceedings in Crime No.162/2023 registered by Women Police Station, Kalaburagi now pending on the file of the I-Additional Civil Judge and JMFC at Kalaburagi in C.C.No.2336/2024 for the offences punishable under Sections 4 98A, 323, 504 , 506 read with Section 3 4 of IPC .

2. The factual matrix leading to the case of the prosecution is that, respondent No.2 married with the son of petitioners. The allegations of the complainant in the complaint are that at the time of marriage, accused No.1 was given 9 tolas of gold, Rs.1,00,000/- cash and all household utensils and spent Rs.4,00,000/- for the purpose of marriage. Accused No.1, a BHMS doctor, addicted to alcohol and because of that addiction he was removed from the job. Whenever the complainant asked her husband as to why he was not going to job and why he was not paying anything to the complainant for the household expenses, he in an inebriated condition, beat her. The complainant has raised a loan of Rs.3,00,000/- to settle the loan of her husband. The only allegations against the petitioners herein are that they abused her stating that because of her their son is addicted to alcohol and she is not preparing good food and not looking after their son. Except this, there is no other allegation against the petitioner.

3. Heard Sri M. M. Allur, learned counsel for the petitioners, Sri G.B. Yadav, learned HCGP for respondent No.1 - State. Respondent No.2 – de facto complainant though served, has remained absent.

4. Sri M. M. Allur submits that there are no specific allegations in the complaint as well as in the charge sheet materials against the petitioners herein. Only because they are the parents of accused No.1, they cannot be roped in the proceedings. They are age old, continuation of proceedings would amount to abuse of process of law and cause miscarriage of justice. To buttress his arguments, he has relied upon the judgment of the Hon’ble Apex Court in the case of Kahkashan Kausar and Ors. vs. State of Bihar and Ors. passed in Criminal Appeal No.195 of 2022 (arising out of SLP (Crl.) No.6545 of 2020) dated 08.02.2022. He also relied upon judgment passed by the Co-ordinate bench of this Court in the case of Ramesh G.H. vs. State of Karnataka 2022 and Another reported in 2022 (4) KCCR 3034 .

5. Refuting the submissions of learned counsel for the petitioners, Sri G.B. Yadav, learned HCGP submits that there are allegations against the petitioners that they are abusing the complainant. This clearly shows that there is mental cruelty to the complainant and the allegations made in the complaint are more than sufficient for the prosecution to continue the proceedings against these petitioners also. The age factor of the petitioners is not a ground to seek quashing of the proceedings, the petitioners and accused No.1 were residing under the same roof, there is all possibility of petitioners tutoring accused No.1 to treat the complainant with cruelty. With this submission, he prays to dismiss the petition.

6. Heard the learned counsel for the parties and perused the records.

7. A perusal of entire prosecution materials, more particularly, the complaint and the statements, entire allegations are made against the husband that he was addicted to alcohol and in an inebriated state he used to beat the complainant. The only allegation against the petitioners is that, they abused her that because of her their son is addicted to alcohol and she is not preparing good food and not looking after their son. All these are common altercations in the family and cann