Vijay Gupta And Ors. vs State Of Madhya Pradesh And Anr.

This petition under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C. has been filed to quash the FIR of Crime No.11/2018 registered at Police Station Karanjiya, District-Dindori for the offence punishable under Section 498-A, 34 of the IPC and consequential proceedings arising out from that crime.

Brief facts of the case which are relevant to the disposal of this revision are that on 30/01/2018 complainant/respondent No.2 Pooja Gupta lodged a report at Police Station Kajariya, District Dindori averring that she married applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta on 17/02/2016 at Gayatri Shakti Peeth, Amarkantak, District-Anuppur. Thereafter, she lived with the applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta-husband, applicant No.2 Dinesh-father-in-law and applicant No.3-Neerajlata mother-in-law. After ten days of her marriage behaviour of the applicants changed with her. They used to demand Rs.3 lakhs and harassed her physically and mentally. Due to which she moved from her inlaw's house and started living in a rented house with her husband applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta. Currently, she is seven to eight months' pregnant. Two months ago, her husband left her and went to live with his parents and is not even arranging for her maintenance. Her parents-in-law are also supporting her husband and they are harassing her. Her parents are poor and cannot fulfil the applicants' demand. For this reason, applicants have been harassing her for almost 2 years. She is currently pregnant and needs support but applicants are trying to drive her away from the rented house too. She is very ill-treated by the applicants. So action be taken against them. On that police registered Crime No.11/2018 for the offence punishable under Section 498-A of the IPC against the applicants and investigated the matter. During the investigation, Police recorded the statements of the complainant herself, Balmukund & Sumitra Gupta, parents of the complainant, Savitri Bai landlord of complainant Pooja Gupta where she resided with the applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta, Dasrath Prasad, Ramnarayan Sahu and Devan neighbour of the complainant and after investigation filed charge-sheet against the applicants. On that charge-sheet Criminal Case, No.209/2018 was registered. Being aggrieved from that applicants have filed this petition.

Learned counsel for the applicants submitted that from the F.I.R. no offence under Section 498-A, 34 of IPC is made out against the applicants. In FIR there is no specific allegation against the applicants regarding demand of dowry and harassment. The marriage of applicant Vijay Gupta and complainant was performed at Gayatri Shakti Peeth, Amarkantak, District Anuppur on 17/02/2016. At the time of marriage complainant/respondent No.2 had filed an application and also sworn an affidavit indicating that she was unmarried and her marriage has never taken place earlier. Thereafter marriage of applicant No.1 and respondent No.2/complainant was solemnized as per Hindu customs & rituals and marriage certificate of the same was issued by Gayatri Shakti Peeth, Amarkantak, District Anuppur after performing the marriage. After, marriage complainant lived in the company of applicants, but the behaviour of the respondent No.2/complainant was not good with the applicants. The respondent No.2/complainant used to quarrel with the applicants No.2 and 3 and used to assault the applicant No.3, due to which applicant No.2 and 3 asked the applicant No.1 and complainant to live separately from the company of applicant no.2 and 3. On that applicant, No.1 started living separately along with the complainant in a rented house. But the behaviour of the complainant did not change and she used to threaten applicants to implicate them in a false criminal case. Feeling aggrieved by the attitude of the complainant, the applicant No.1 lodged a report against her on 30/9/2016 at P.S. Karanjiya, District-Dindori. He further submitted that in the meantime it was revealed that before marrying the applicant No.1, the complainant had already married with one Kamlesh Gupta, resident of Hanumantal, Jabalpur and without getting a valid divorce from Kamlesh Gupta, complainant performed marriage with the applicant no.1 Vijay Gupta by suppressing this fact. Learned counsel for the applicant further submitted that since the complainant was a married lady and she performed second marriage with the applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta, without getting divorce from her earlier husband, applicant No.1 filed a criminal complaint against the respondent No.2/complainant and her parents under Section 420, 500/34 of the IPC and also filed a Civil Case 78A/2016 under Section 11 of Hindu Marriage Act for annulment of marriage in the court of Principal Judge Family Court Dindori. Learned Principal Judge Family Court vide judgment and decree dated 09/11/2017 allowed the applicant's petition and declared the marriage between applicant No.1 and respondent No.2/complainant null and void. Thereafter, the complainant filed this false complaint against the applicants to harass them. Hence, it is prayed that the Hence, it is prayed, that the FIR of Crime No.11/2018 registered at Police Station Karanjiya, District-Dindori against the applicants and its consequential proceedings be quashed. In support of his contention learned counsel placed reliance on the judgement passed by the Coordinate Bench of this Court in the case of Ramkumar Sarathe and others Vs. State of Madhya Pradesh & another in M.Cr.C.No.15859/2017 decided on 23/1/2018 and another judgement passed by Coordinate Bench of this Court in the case of Uday Narayan and Ors. Vs. State of M.P. and Ors. reported in 2017 (IV) MPJR (SC) 107.

Learned counsel for the respondent/State opposed the prayer and submitted that at the stage of framing of charge, only charge-sheet has to be seen and from the charge-sheet it is apparent that the applicants who are the husband, father-in-law and mother-in-law of the complainant/respondent No.2 respectively used to harass her and demanded dowry, so learned trial Court did not commit any mistake in framing the charge against the applicants for the offence punishable under Sections 498-A red with 34 of the IPC. Respondent No.2/complainant performed marriage with the applicant No.1 suppressing the fact that she was already married, or her behaviour was not good with the applicants and she harassed the applicants and lodged a false report against the applicants is the defence of the applicants which cannot be considered at this stage because it requires evidence to decide. Hence, it is prayed that the petition be dismissed.

This Court has gone through the record and arguments advanced by the learned counsel for the parties.

The Apex Court in the case of Varala Bharath Kumar v. State of Telangana, (2017) 9 SCC 413 (supra) held as under:-

"6. It is by now well settled that the extraordinary power under Article 226 or inherent power under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure can be exercised by the High Court, either to prevent abuse of process of the court or otherwise to secure the ends of justice. Where allegations made in the first information report/the complaint or the outcome of investigation as found in the charge- sheet, even if they are taken at their face value and accepted in their entirety do not prima facie constitute any offence or make out the case against the accused; where the allegations do not disclose the ingredients of the offence alleged; where the uncontroverted allegations made in the first information report or complaint and the material collected in support of the same do not disclose the commission of offence alleged and make out a case against the accused; where a criminal proceeding is manifestly attended with mala fide and/or where the proceeding is maliciously instituted with an ulterior motive for wreaking vengeance on the accused and with a view to spite him due to private and personal grudge, the power under Article 226 of the Constitution of India or under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure may be exercised.

While exercising power under Section 482 or under Article 226 in such matters, the court does not function as a court of appeal or revision. Inherent jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code though wide has to be exercised sparingly, carefully or with caution and only when such exercise is justified by the tests specifically laid down under Section 482 itself. It is to be exercised ex debito justitiae to do real and substantial justice, for the administration of which alone courts exist. The court must be careful and see that its decision in exercise of its power is based on sound principles. The inherent powers should not be exercised to stifle a legitimate prosecution. Of course, no hard-and-fast rule can be laid down in regard to cases in which the High Court will exercise its extraordinary jurisdiction of quashing the proceedings at any stage."

Which shows that High Court may exercise inherent powers to quash a FIR only when the allegations made in the FIR do not disclose the commission of any offence or are so absurd and inherently improbable on the basis of which no prudent person can ever reach a just conclusion that there is sufficient ground for proceeding against the accused and/or where the proceeding is maliciously instituted with an ulterior motive for wreaking vengeance on the accused and with a view to spite him due to private and personal grudge.

In the instant case, it is apparent from the record that after investigation of the report lodged by non-applicant no.2 Police found prima facie case against the applicants and filed charge sheet against them. In the FIR it is clearly mentioned that applicants used to demand Rs.3 lakhs and harassed complainant physically and mentally this fact is also corroborated by the case diary statements of Balmukund & Sumitra Gupta, parents of the complainant, Savitri Bai, landlord of complainant Pooja Gupta in her house she resided with the applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta, Dasrath Prasad, Ramnarayan Sahu and Devan neighbour of the complainant. So, offence under Section 498-A of IPC is prima facie made out against the applicants. Whether the allegations levelled by non-applicant no.2 in the FIR are true or not cannot be ascertained at this stage on evaluating the prosecution evidence on the merits. Although applicants also filed some documents showing the fact that earlier the marriage of complainant was solemnized with one Kamlesh and without getting divorce from Kamlesh she married applicant No. 1 Vijay Gupta, those documents cannot be considered at this stage because the evidence is required to prove these documents. Applicants have also filed copy of judgement dated 09/11/2017 passed by Principal Judge, Family Court, Dindori in Civil Case No.78-A/2016, whereby learned Principal Judge, Family Court declared marriage of the applicant No.1 Vijay with complainant Pooja Gupta void on the basis that at the time when Pooja Gupta married with the applicant No.1 Vijay Gupta, she was already married to one Kamlesh, the resident of Jabalpur but the said judgement is ex-parte judgement and learned counsel for the applicants is not in a position to inform the Court whether said judgement is still in existence or not, whether complainant has filed any application before Family Court to set aside that expert judgement or not. So that judgements also cannot be considered at this stage.

The facts of the cases Ramkumar Sarathe and others Vs. State of Madhya Pradesh (supra) and Uday Narayan and Ors. Vs. State of M.P. and Ors. (supra) relied upon by the learned counsel for the applicants do not match with the present case. In the first case, the coordinate Bench of this Court quashed the proceedings of a criminal case on the ground that the Judicial Magistrate First Class Jabalpur had no territorial jurisdiction to take cognizance of the case against the petitioners. While in this case it is alleged that the harassment of complainant was committed by the applicants in the territorial jurisdiction of Judicial Magistrate First Class, Dindori and police also filed charge-sheet before Judicial Magistrate First Class, Dindori. In the second case, the coordinate Bench of this Court quashed the proceeding of a criminal case against the father-in-law and mother-in-law of the complainant on the ground that they resided at Ajmer. While in this case applicant No.2 father-in-law and applicant No.3 mother-in-law of the complainant allegedly reside in the same town, so these judgements do not help the applicant.

In the considered opinion of this court, the grounds raised by the applicants in this petition are the defence of the applicants and requires evidence to decide and cannot be considered at this stage. From the charge sheet, prima facie offence under section 498A of the IPC is made out against the applicants. So, the FIR of Crime No.11/2018 registered at Police Station Karanjiya, District-Dindori for the offence punishable under Section 498-A, 34 of the IPC and consequential proceedings arising out from that crime cannot be quashed.

Hence, this petition is dismissed with the liberty that the applicants are free to raise their objections before the trial Court at the appropriate stage.

Certified copy as per rules.