Nagpur: Expressing concern over false complaints filed by wives against husbands and in-laws, the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court observed that such tendency is growing and the judiciary must be extremely cautious while handling matrimonial disputes.
“Nowadays, the tendency of falsely implicating husband and all his immediate relations in over enthusiasm and anxiety to seek conviction for maximum people without visualizing that such complaint can lead to insurmountable agony and pain to the entire family has developed,” a division bench comprising justices Vinay Deshpande and Anil Kilor said.
Quoting the Supreme Court, the bench added that the courts must take pragmatic realities into consideration while dealing with matrimonial cases.
“The overt acts attributed to persons other than husband are required to be proved beyond reasonable doubt. By mere conjectures and implications, such relations can’t be held guilty. The harassment allegation against the husband’s close relations, who had been living in different cities and never or rarely visited the wife’s place, would have an entirely different complexion. Such allegations are required to be scrutinized with great care and circumspection.”
Allowing two petitions filed by the husband and his parents and other by his relatives through counsel Kartik Shukul, the bench said if wife’s complaint is considered, no prudent man would arrive at a conclusion that the father-in-law and mother-in-law, who have been driven away from their house, the husband who was forced to close down his business and to work as a security guard in a private company, by creating such compelling circumstances at her instance would ill-treat or maltreat her.
Pointing towards earlier FIR lodged by a husband against wife in 2016, the judges said he had given a complete narration regarding ill-treatment meted out to him and parents. “From wife’s conduct, this court without any hesitation or doubt can say that her FIR is nothing but a counter blast to the husband’s complaint. It was also an outcome of eviction order passed by a sub-divisional officer in a case filed by in-laws against her for driving them out from their own house.”
While quashing the wife’s police complaint against the husband and in-laws, the judges made it clear that by compelling the petitioners to face the trial before criminal court will amount to miscarriage of justice. “The wife’s FIR registered with Wadgaon Road Police Station in Yavatmal under Sections 498-A, 504, 506 read with Section 34 of the IPC is nothing but an abuse of process of law. We find the present case as a fit one to exercise jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.”