IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA Cr.Misc. No.52222 of 2007 1. SURJIT KAUR, W/o Late Kawaljit Singh. 2. Karandip Singh, S/o Late Kawaljit Singh. Both are resident of 217 B.K. Camp, Dhaka Village, Near Om Dairy, New Delhi-110009. 3. Jatinder Kaur @ Bami, Wife of Maninder Singh, Resident of H-27, House No. 2, Lane No. 8, Western Venue Sainik Farm, Khanpur, New Delhi-110062. ……Petitioners. Versus 1. THE STATE OF BIHAR. 2. Davindra Kaur @ Satnam Kaur, D/o Late Balwante W/o Tejpal Singh @ Tejpal Singh Dhir, Resident of Babareki Gate, P.S.-Chowk, Dist.-Patna. ……..Opposite Parties. with Cr.Misc. No.53384 of 2007 1. AMARJIT KAUR, W/o Bhajan Singh Dhir @ Panchan Singh. 2. Bhajan Singh Dhir @ Panchan Singh, S/o Late Atma Singh. Both are resident of F 1st -114/115, Lajpatnagar, New Delhi-110024. ……Petitioners. Versus 1. THE STATE OF BIHAR. 2. Davindra Kaur @ Satnam Kaur, D/o Late Balwante Wife of Tejpal Singh @ Tejpal Singh Dhir, R/o Bareki Gate, P.S.- Chowk District-Patna. ……Opposite Parties. ----------- For the Petitioners : Mr. Rama Kant Sharma, Sr. Adv. For the O.P. No. 2 : Mr. Vishwanath Pd. Sinha, Sr. Adv. : Md. Iqbal Asif Niazi, Adv. ---------- 05. 19.03.2010 1. Heard the parties. 2. The petitioners of Cr. Misc. No. 5222/07 are the aunt-in-law, cousin brother-in-law and married sister-in-law and of Cr. Misc. No. 53384/07 are the parents-in-law of the informant respectively. - 2 - 3. The petitioners seek quashing of the entire proceeding including the order dated 05.09.2007 by which ACJM Patna City has taken cognizance for the offences under Section 498A/34 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 3/4 of Dowry Prohibition Act in Chowk P.S. Case No. 149 of 2007. 4. On the last occasion the Opposite Party No. 2 was noticed and upon such notice the informant has filed appearance before this Court. 5. The case of the informant is that she was married to Tejpal Singh on 14.04.2002 in New Delhi and after the same started living in her in-laws house at Lajpatnagar in New Delhi. All the accused persons after her marriage started taunting her for bringing less dowry and she was physically, mentally and emotionally tortured in various ways by the accused persons on account of non-fulfilment of their demands for dowry. Her father was also turned away from the house by the accused persons. When she gave birth to a daughter on 30.10.2003, who was four years of age at the time of the institution of the First Information Report, the in-laws started insulting her for having given birth to a girl child and desired a male child in - 3 - the subsequent pregnancy. In the ultrasound report when it was found that she was pregnant with a girl child she was aborted forcibly by the accused persons in February, 2007. When she was one month pregnant she was turned away from the house so she went to her brother’s house who brought her back to in-laws house and she could enter in-laws house only on the intervention of the police who reached there on hearing a commotion. The accused persons allegedly assaulted her on 30.07.2007 when she refused to get an ultrasound done due to which she aborted. She was also threatened that her brother would be falsely implicated on trumped charges if she protested. Due to this said torture the informant alleged that she came back to her maternal house at Patna City where she was living presently. Thereafter on 03.06.2007 the informant’s husband Tejpal Singh, Karandip Singh, cousin brother-in-law, the petitioner No. 2 and Jatinder Kaur, the sister-in-law, Petitioner No. 3 of Cr. Misc. No. 5222/07 came to her house at Patna City and told her that she would not be kept any more and coerced her to sign on some blank papers purportedly for preparing divorce papers. This information was given to the local - 4 - police on 05.06.2007 who after investigation submitted charge-sheet for the offences under Section 498A/34 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 3/4 of Dowry Prohibition Act and the Court took cognizance under the said sections and issued summons to the accused persons. 6. It has been submitted that in the entire complaint there is a total absence of any specific overt act against the petitioners and no offence under Section 498A and 3/4 Dowry Prohibition Act is made out against the present petitioners. The further submission is that the entire act appears to have been done at New Delhi and therefore the Patna City Court in want of territorial jurisdiction is precluded from proceeding any further in the matter. The additional submission on behalf of the petitioner Nos. 1 and 2 of Cr. Misc. No. 53384 of 2007 is that they, being not directly related to the husband of the informant, it is not believable that they would interfere in the daily affairs of the informant’s in-laws. 7. The submission of the counsel for the Opposite Party No. 2 is that there is enough material to proceed against all the accused persons and even if no - 5 - specific overt act is mentioned in the complaint since all their actions were inter-linked and finally culminated in the act of the three specifically named accused persons compelling the informant to file divorce papers, they would all be liable for prosecution. For this very reason the Patna City Court within which jurisdiction the papers were allegedly got signed had jurisdiction as well. The alternative submission of the Opposite Party No. 2 is that if it is held that the Patna City Court for want of jurisdiction is not the competent court the complaint may be transferred to a court having such jurisdiction. 8. On perusal of the First Information Report this Court finds the allegations of demands for dowry is confined to a period before 2003 but there is no explanation as to why a belated complaint was made in year 2007 after four years. This Court also finds that apart from the relationship vis-à-vis the complainant/informant having been mentioned in the beginning of the FIR, no specific role has been allotted to any of the petitioners with regard to the excesses committed upon her. The content of FIR is rambling in nature, totally general and vogue. The Hon’ble Apex - 6 - Court has repeatedly cautioned that issuance of summons being a serious matter, since the same jeopardizes the liberty of a citizen, a criminal court is required to scrutinize the case against each accused, before doing so. 9. Apart from this if we examine the legal provision of Section 498A and the definition of cruelty mentioned therein is as follows:- 1. A woman must be married. 2. She must be subjected to cruelty. 3. Cruelty must be of the nature of: (i) any wilful conduct as was likely to drive such woman: a. to commit suicide; b. cause grave injury or danger to her life, limb, either mental or physical; (ii) harassment of such woman, (1) with a view to coerce her to meet unlawful demand for property or valuable security, (2) or on account of failure of such woman or by any of her relation to meet the unlawful demand; (iii) woman was subjected to such cruelty by; (1) husband of that woman, or (2) any relative of the husband. For constitution of an offence under Section 498-A IPC, therefore, the ingredients thereof must be held to be existing. The ingredients as mentioned above must be existing in the nature of the complaint. Thus for proving the offence under Section 498A, there must be - 7 - an allegation that the harassment was to an extent that she was driven to commit suicide or there was grave injury to life, limb or health or the harassment of such women was with a view to coerce her to meet unlawful demands and on its failure she was subjected to such cruelty by her husband or any relative of the husband. 10. In this background when this Court examines the allegations made in the FIR, I find no such allegation, having been made against the present petitioners to enable me to arrive at a conclusion that prima facie they have committed such an offence. So far as the present petitioners are concerned the material is totally inadequate to show that they specifically committed any act which would make them liable for prosecution under Section 498A. 11. Moreover, recently in a case reported in 2008 (2) SCC 561 the Hon’ble Supreme Court while hearing an application for quashing a proceeding under Section 498A expressed its views and indicated a word of caution that the provisions could be used as a device to achieve oblique motives. Moreover a general dissatisfaction of a person or a marital discord in a matrimonial home would not necessarily be enough to - 8 - put the entire family on trial in a criminal case. While hearing an application for quashing under Section 482 Cr.P.C. this Court is conscious of its duty to do substantial justice for which this Court exists which translates to mean that no person should be un- necessarily put on trial. 12. In view of such facts, I find that no offence whatsoever is made out against any of the present petitioners even if at the fag end of the First Information Report specifically the names of the petitioner Nos. 2 & 3 have been appended who allegedly come to Patna City and coerced her into signing some documents purportedly for an application for divorce. Also, I am informed by the parties that till date the purported signed documents have not been used anywhere in the Court. 13. Under the circumstances, these applications are allowed and proceeding including the order dated 05.09.2007 by which ACJM Patna City has taken cognizance in Chowk P.S. Case No. 149 of 2007 is quashed with regard to the present petitioners alone. Vikash/- (Anjana Prakash, J.)