A court here has reduced two years’ imprisonment to a man in a case of torturing his wife for dowry.
He was also sentenced to one-year imprisonment for keeping various articles of his wife, which the court modified to six months’ imprisonment.
Additional Sessions Judge Sanjay Bansal granted the relief to convict Mohammed Shamim on the grounds that he faced trial for 18 years.
“The appellant has faced this trial from 2000... It is a long period. Considering all facts and circumstances, sentence of appellant for the offence under Section 498-A Indian Penal Code is reduced to rigorous imprisonment for one year; and sentence for the offence under 406 [criminal breach of trust] Indian Penal Code is reduced to rigorous imprisonment for six months. Sentences of fine [₹12,000] are maintained. Both the sentences shall run concurrently,” the Judge said.
The convict had come in an appeal in the sessions court against the judgment by a Metropolitan Magistrate who had convicted him and awarded the punishment.
‘No illegality’
The Judge said, “There is no infirmity or illegality in the finding given by the trial court regarding ill treatment and commission of cruelties by the appellant. The conduct of the appellant was covered within the mischief of Section 498-A IPC. The appellant was rightly convicted for the said offence... Various stridhan articles were recovered from possession of the appellant. These articles were kept by appellant without authority and without consent of complainant. Therefore, appellant was rightly convicted under Section 406 IPC.”
In her complaint, the woman said that three months after their marriage in 1992, Shamim started harassing her for more dowry. He would beat her after getting drunk and demand a three-wheeler, a TV and a fridge.