The court established that consensual relationships do not automatically lead to rape allegations based on broken promises, emphasizing the necessity of consent.

ORDER

This bail application is filed under section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita , 2023 (for short ‘ BNSS ’).

2. Petitioner is the sole accused in Crime No.1552/2025 of Kodungallur Police Station, Thrissur, registered alleging offences punishable under Sections 64 (1), 64(2)(m), 69, 74, 75(2), 332(b) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita , 2023 (for short ‘ BNS ’).

3. According to the prosecution, the accused had in January

2024, raped the defacto complainant and thereafter, pursuant to a promise of marriage, took her to a movie theater in April 2025, and inserted his fingers into her private parts, and again sexually assaulted her, and thereby committed the offences alleged. Petitioner was arrested on 03.09.2025 and he has been in custody since then.

4. I have heard the learned Counsel for the petitioner as well as the learned Public Prosecutor.

5. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the entire prosecution allegations are totally false and the petitioner has been in custody since 03.09.2025, and he ought to be released on bail.

6. The learned Public Prosecutor opposed the bail application.

7. Petitioner and the victim were concededly friends from their school days. During 2023, their friendship was renewed pursuant to a friend request received through Facebook. During the time of the renewal of friendship itself, the victim was a married lady with two children. However, the victim alleged that the accused had invited her to his house at a time when there was nobody else in his house and raped her. The statement also reveals that, even subsequently, they had engaged in sexual intercourse on various occasions, resulting in her husband initiating proceedings for divorce, on becoming aware of the relationship. The victim specifically stated that she was in love with the petitioner and that she had gone with him to a movie theater in Ernakulam, and that he sexually assaulted her inside that theater. 8. A reading of the above referred statement indicates that petitioner and the victim were in a romantic relationship, notwithstanding her marital status. Prima facie, there are materials to suggest, from the statement of the victim itself, that, she was engaged in an illicit relationship with the petitioner.

9. In the decision in Naim Ahamed v. State of [NCT of Delhi]

[2025 SCC OnLine SC89], it was observed that the prosecutrix who herself was a married woman, could not be said to have acted on the alleged false promise of marriage.

8. Again in Prashant v. State of NCT, Delhi [2024 INSC 879] , the Supreme Court had observed that merely because a relationship between a couple turned sour and the marriage did not take place are not reasons to assume that the offence of rape was committed or that the physical relationship was entered into on the basis of a false promise of marriage.

9. Yet again inAmol Bhagwan Nehul vs. State of Maharashtra [2025 INSC 782] the Supreme Court observed that a consensual relationship turning sour at a later point in time or partners becoming distant cannot be a ground for invoking the criminal machinery of the State and that such conduct not only burdens the Courts, but blots the identity of an individual accused of such a heinous offence. The decision inSameer Ibrahim v. State of Kerala [2024 (4) KLT 201] , is also relevant in this context.

10. Having regard to the circumstances as revealed from the statement of the victim, I am satisfied that the continued detention of the petitioner is not necessary.

11. In the result, this application is allowed on the following conditions:-

(a) Petitioner shall be released on bail on him executing a bond for Rs.50,000/- (Rupees fifty thousand only) with two solvent sureties each for the like sum to the sat