The central legal point established in the judgment is the importance of voluntary consent and the absence of deceit or false promises in determining the nature of a relationship and distinguishing between rape and consensual sex.

JUDGMENT :

Sandeep Mehta, J.

1. The instant criminal miscellaneous petition under Section 482 Cr.P.C. has been filed by the petitioner Sachin Shukla seeking quashing of the FIR No. 135/2019 registered at the Police Station Savina, District Udaipur for the offence under Section 376 IPC.

2. The respondent No. 2 complainant lodged the FIR with the following allegations:-

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3. The petitioner seeks quashing of the above FIR imploring the court to exercise its inherent powers under Section 482 Cr.P.C. claiming that the allegations levelled in the impugned FIR, even if taken on the face value, do not constitute the offence alleged.

4. Mr. Deepak Menaria, learned counsel representing the petitioner, placed reliance on the judgments of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in (1) Dr. Dhruvaram Murlidhar Sonar vs. The State of Maharashtra & Ors., AIR 2019 SC 327 and (2) Maheshwar Tigga vs. The State of Jharkhand, (2020) 10 SCC 108 and fervently urged that the relationship between the complainant and the petitioner, which continued unabatedly for almost 12 years, was purely consensual without any element of deceit involved in it. However, at a later point of time, strain developed in the relations, after which, the petitioner parted ways with the complainant. The impugned FIR has been filed purely with oblique motive of harassing and humiliating the petitioner and is full of false and fabricated allegations. He, thus, prays that the impugned FIR deserves to be quashed.

5. Per contra, learned Public Prosecutor and Mr. Jitendra Ojha, learned counsel representing the complainant, have vehemently and fervently opposed the submissions advanced by the learned counsel for the petitioner. They contend that the petitioner sexually exploited the complainant for a period of almost 12 years under a totally fraudulent promise of marriage. Thereafter, he lost interest in the complainant and ditched her and contracted marriage with another woman. They, thus, urged that this court should refrain from interfering in the impugned FIR at the inception.

6. I have given my thoughtful consideration to the submissions advanced by the learned counsel for the parties and gone through the material available on record.

7. Going by the contents of the FIR, it is clear that the complainant is a mature woman aged 27 years. She and the petitioner lived in the immediate neighbourhood and developed intimacy with each other. They were involved in a purely consensual relationship with each other for nearly a decade. In this duration, both indulged in sexual relations in an unhindered manner. The complainant alleged in the FIR that the petitioner had promised to marry her and that the physical relations were established under this fictitious assurance. However, there is no mention in the report as to when such promise was made. She claims to have realized the fact that the petitioner's promise to marry her was fraudulent only when she came to know that the petitioner was marrying another woman on 19.04.2019. Ex facie, upon a perusal of the impugned FIR, this court is of a firm opinion that the decade long relationship between the