IMPORTANT POINT
Marriage can negate prior allegations of rape if the parties have entered into a valid marital relationship, preventing abuse of legal process.

ORDER :

With the consent of learned counsel for the parties the matter is finally heard.

2. This petition under section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code has been preferred by the petitioner/accused for quashing the FIR bearing Crime No. 598/2019 registered under section 376(2)(n), 313, 294 of the Indian Penal Code at Police Station Nagda, District Ujjain.

3. As per the prosecution, on 5-12-2019 a written complaint was made by the prosecutrix/respondent No. 2 to the effect that she had been engaged to be married to the petitioner in August, 2016 by consent of the families of both of them. Thereafter she had started talking to the petitioner. One day the petitioner had come to her house when she was alone and had committed rape upon her. When she started crying he stated that since now they are engaged he will marry her immediately upon completion of her graduation and she should not narrate the incident to her family members else he would break the engagement and shall malign her. Due to the threat she did not narrate the incident to anyone. Thereafter she had become pregnant and the petitioner under the false pretext of giving her a vitamin tablet had given her a tablet for abortion as a result of which her fetus was aborted. She told the petitioner that he has ruined her life and she would tell everything to her parents and that he should marry her, which he refused stating that she has still not graduated. She waited for the graduation but when her parents asked him for the marriage he refused stating that the prosecutrix is not worth marrying. The petitioner had also taken her under the false pretext to Chintaman Ganesh Temple, Ujjain and had created a false marriage ceremony and had got her signatures on various documents. He did not take her home after the marriage and when she went to Sagar where he was posted he turned her out of the house. Thereafter the report was lodged by the prosecutrix, on the basis of which the instant FIR has been registered against the petitioner.

4. Learned counsel for the petitioner has submitted that initiation and continuation of the proceedings by respondent No. 2 against the petitioner is a gross abuse of the process of law by her. The prosecutrix as per her own version had got married to the petitioner on 26-12-2017 at Chintaman Ganesh Temple according to Hindu rites and ceremonies. Thereafter a Marriage Certificate of the petitioner with the prosecutrix was also issued by the Registrar of Marriage, Gram Panchayat, Chintaman, Janpad Panchayat, Ujjain, District Ujjain on 26-12-2017. On disputes having arisen between the parties, the prosecutrix had made a complaint before Parivar Paramarsh Kendra, Mahila Thana, Ujjain in which she had categorically stated that the petitioner is her husband and has been harassing her. Her statement was also recorded in which she stated that she had married the petitioner on 26-12-2017 at Chintaman Ganesh Temple, Ujjain and that the same was a love marriage. She categorically stated that the petitioner is her husband and is a Doctor and posted at Sagar and that disputes have been going on between them for about a year and she wants that the petitioner should keep her with dignity. In the report of those proceedings it was recorded that both the parties reached to an amicable settlement and would live together thereafter. A complaint was also made by the prosecutrix to the City Superintendent of Police, Ujjain in which also she stated that the petitioner is her husband and in those proceedings also it was found that the petitioner is the husband of the prosecutrix and there have been matrimonial disputes between them which have however been settled. It is submitted that the entire allegations as levelled by the prosecutrix as regards commission of rape by him are prior in point of time to her marriage with him which as per the prosecutrix herself stand condoned on account of her having married the petitioner. It is not the allegation that any such act has been