Divorce plea can’t quash dowry case, says Supreme Court

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has recently observed that allegations of dowry demand cannot be called as highly improbable if the wife is suffering from AIDS or the divorce proceedings are pending.“Merely because the wife was suffering from the disease AIDS and/or divorce petition was pending, it cannot be said that the allegations of demand of dowry were highly/inherently improbable and the said proceedings can be said to be bogus proceedings,” a bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar has observed.

The court’s order was passed in a plea challenging Allahabad HC’s May 9, 2019 ruling by which the court had quashed the criminal proceedings for section 498A/506 of IPC and sections 3/4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961. The relief was granted by the HC to the husband after considering that the allegations of demand of dowry were inherently improbable. According to the HC, the demand was “inherently improbable” as the original complainant (wife) was suffering from AIDS and a divorce
petition was also pending between the parties.

Terming the HC’s order as “erroneous”, bench in their order said, “the reasoning given by the HC while quashing the criminal proceedings are not germane and the HC while quashing the criminal proceedings in exercise of powers under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (CrPC) has seriously erred and exceeded in its jurisdiction under Section 482 of CrPC. Once the charge sheet was filed, it cannot be said that the prosecution was bogus. Under the circumstances, the impugned judgment and order passed by the HC quashing the criminal proceedings is unsustainable.”

In this case, the husband filed an application for divorce on the ground that the wife is suffering from the disease AIDS. The wife, thereafter, lodged FIR alleging that husband was demanding luxury car by way of dowry. The Allahabad High Court quashed the criminal proceedings observing that the complaint lodged against the husband demand of dowry is inherently improbable and that it falls in the category of a bogus prosecution.