IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Date of Decision: 19.12.2025 AKASHDEEP SINGH ......Petitioner Versus STATE OF PUNJAB .....Respondent CORAM: HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE KIRTI SINGH Present: Ms. Dolli Sharma, Advocate for the petitioner.

Mr. Luvinder Sofat, Sr. DAG, Punjab.

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KIRTI SINGH , J. (ORAL)

CRM-50178-2025 Allowed as prayed for subject to all just exceptions. Annexures P-11 and P-12 are taken on record.

CRM-M-62411-2025

1. The jurisdiction of this Court under Section 483 BNSS has been invoked for grant of regular bail to the petitioner in case FIR No.213 dated 12.08.2025 under Sections 64 and 351(2) of BNS and Section 6 of POCSO Act, registered at Police Station Ajnala, District Amritsar Rural.

2. The translated version of the FIR is reproduced below:-

“Statement of xxxxx, wife of Harjit Singh, resident of Talwandi Rai Dadu, age about 17 years and 6 months, Police Station Ajnala, District Amritsar, Mobile number 82849-xxxxxx, stated that I am a resident of the above stated address and do domestic work. I was married to Harjit Singh, son of Sukhdev Singh, resident of Talwandi Rai Dadu in the year 2021 and I have 2 children, one boy and one girl. Our neighbour Akashdeep Singh, son of Sonu Singh resident of Talwandi Rai Dadu, who used to visit our house a lot, used to have a bad eye on me. He kept asking me to have a relationship with him. I told him that I am married and I have children too. I cannot do this to you. He tempted me that I will treat you and your children better than your husband Harjit Singh. You should marry me. When I did not agree to this, Akashdeep Singh threatened me that if you do not marry me or do not stay in a relationship with me, I will kill your husband Harjit Singh and both the children, which I was afraid of, so I went to my maternal village Gujarpura, which Akashdeep Singh came to know about. On 20.05.2025, at around 09:30 in the morning, I was alone at home when Akashdeep Singh came to my maternal village Gujarpura, and forcibly put me on a motorcycle and took me with him to his aunt's house in village Bhindi Saida, where Akashdeep Singh had continuous sexual relations with me without my consent and then threatened me and filed a writ in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Chandigarh against my husband Harjit Singh and my in-laws' family members, on which the police of Ajnala police station registered a case against my husband Harjit Singh and my mother xxxxx, which I was afraid of the said Akashdeep Singh and, following his words, filed a writ in the Hon'ble High Court, Chandigarh against my husband Harjit Singh and mother xxxxx, etc. Akashdeep Singh has forced me by misleading me and threatening to kill my husband Harjit Singh and children, having sexual intercourse with me without my consent and raping me, regarding which I have come to the police station today with my mother xxxxx to give a report. Action should be taken against Akashdeep Singh. 1 have written a statement and have heard it and read it which is correct. Sd/- xxxx”

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner inter alia submits that the petitioner, slightly over 18 years of age, has been falsely implicated in the instant FIR which was registered on the statement of the prosecutrix. While narrating the incidents that had occurred prior to the registration of the present FIR, learned counsel submits that the petitioner had helped the family of the prosecutrix, who had been married of as a child, had rescued her from her husband and in-laws family. Thereafter, the prosecutrix and her parents with the assistance of the petitioner approached this Court by way of a petition seeking protection from the husband and in-laws family of the prosecutrix. Pursuant thereof the prosecutrix in her statement recorded before the learned Magistrate stated that her child marriage had been performed by her mother. Regarding the petitioner, it was the consistence observation that he had, with bona fide intention, extended help to the prosecutrix