Chander Kanta Lamba & Ors. vs State & Ors.
2009 Latest Caselaw 5316 Del

*              IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI

+                   CRL.REV. P. NO.267/2008

                                        Reserved on : 30.7.2009
                                   Date of Decision : 21.12.2009

CHANDER KANTA LAMBA & ORS.                     ......Petitioners
                    Through:             Ms.Geeta Luthra, Sr.Adv.
                                         with Mr.Jatin Sehgal,
                                         Advocate.

                               Versus

STATE & ORS.                               ...... Respondents
                              Through:   Mr.Jaideep Malik, APP for
                                         the State.
                                         Mr.Tiger Singh, Adv. for
                                         the respondent no.2.


CORAM :
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE V.K. SHALI

1.     Whether Reporters of local papers may be
       allowed to see the judgment?                   YES
2.     To be referred to the Reporter or not ?        YES
3.     Whether the judgment should be reported
       in the Digest ?                                YES

V.K. SHALI, J.

1. This is a revision petition filed by Chander Kanta Lamba,

Suman Bhardwaj, Manju Mal and Neeru Behl-sisters in law

of the complainant Ms.Namrata Behl against the order

dated 04.03.2008 by virtue of which the learned MM,

Patiala House Courts directed the framing of charge under

Section 498A/34 IPC against the petitioners.

2. Briefly stated the facts of the case are that the complainant

got married with one Sh.Naresh Behl according to Hindu

rites and ceremonies on 17.1.2000 in Delhi. It seems that

the marriage did not last long and resulted in breakdown,

as a consequence of which the complainant, Ms.Namrata

Behl lodged a complaint on 11.9.2001 with the Crime

Against Women Cell to take action against her husband

Naresh Behl and his other family members for allegedly

making illegal demand of dowry and treating her with

cruelty. On the basis of the said complaint, an FIR

No.111/2002 was registered at P.S. Malviya Nagar by the

police against Naresh Behl (husband), Mohini (mother in

law)(since deceased), Chander Kanta Lamba, Suman

Bhardwaj, Manju Mal, Poonam Behl and Neeru Behl-sisters

in law and one Rajiv Behl, brother in law of the

complainant.

3. After investigation, the charge sheet was filed. While as all

the accused persons were sent for trial the name of Poonam

Trehan was shown in column No.2 in the charge sheet.

She was residing out of India. Column No.2 deals with the

persons who are not sent for trial for lack of evidence.

4. It has been stated in the impugned order that so far as the

mother in law of the deceased is concerned, she has

expired during the pendency of the proceedings and

accordingly, the proceedings vide order dated 20.6.2006

against her are deemed to have abated.

5. In the complaint, the main allegation made by the

complainant against the accused persons and their brother

Naresh Behl was that they had demanded a sum of Rs.5

lacs and her articles were retained which are alleged to

have been returned to her during the pendency of the

investigation. So far as the present petitioners are

concerned, the allegations made in the complaint are that

Chander Kanta Lamba, Suman Bhardwaj and Manju Mal

use to plant false stories about the complainant and Manju

Mal and Neeru Behl had also deliberately and intentionally

removed the money from the purse of their mother, Mohini

and accused the complainant of stealing her money. There

are general allegations that all the sisters in law namely the

present petitioners had subjected her to demand of dowry

and consequent cruelty on the basis of which they deserves

to be dealt with in accordance with law.

6. The learned Magistrate after hearing arguments discharged

Rajesh brother in law of the complainant while as it

directed framing of charge against the present petitioners

for an offence u/s 498A IPC only.

7. The learned counsel for the petitioners had cited six

judgments, which are detailed below:

" i) Neera Singh Vs. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi) & Ors. 138 (2007) DLT 152

ii) Anu Gill Vs. State & Anr. 2001 (2) JCC (Delhi)

iii) Ramandeep Kaur Vs. State of Punjab 2001 (4) RCR (Criminal) 394

iv) Mukesh Rani Vs. State of Haryana 2002 (1) RCR (Criminal) 163

v) Ujjal Maitra & Ors. Vs. Kanchan Maitra 1998 Cri.L.J. 1002

vi) Ramesh & Ors. Vs. State of Tamil Nadu AIR 2005 SC 1989"

8. But the learned MM has distinguished cases of Anu Gill,

Ramandeep Kaur, Ramesh and Ujjal Mitra and observed

that the facts of these cases are totally different and there

are allegations against the present petitioners which

constitutes subjecting the complainant to cruelty, if not

physical at least the mental which falls within the ambit of

Section 498A IPC and therefore, directed the framing of

charge u/s 498A of the IPC.

9. As regards, the offence u/s 406 of IPC all the accused

persons were discharged from the aforesaid offence.

10. The petitioners feeling aggrieved by the aforesaid impugned

order have preferred the present revision petition.

11. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioners and the

complainant as well as the learned APP.

12. The main contention of the learned Senior counsel for the

petitioners is that the learned MM has grossly erred and

committed illegality by directing framing of charge against

the present petitioners, who were admittedly married much

prior to the marriage of the complainant with the brother of

the petitioners. It is contended that they were living in

their matrimonial homes separately and peacefully. They

had obviously no reason to make suggestions to the

complainant to get the dowry from her parents or subject

her to cruelty. The learned Senior counsel has referred to

the authorities which were cited before the learned

Magistrate in order to urge the point that invariably in a

matrimonial dispute there is a tendency on the part of the

complainant to enrope almost all the relatives once the

relations get strained between the parties and this is

precisely what has been done in the instant case.

13. Secondly on merits also, it has been contended by the

learned Senior counsel that the allegations which are made

against the present petitioners are too generic in nature

which are highly improbable to be believed. No date, time

or place has been given by the complainant in her

complaint and moreover an impression is sought to be

created as if all the petitioners had made the demand for

dowry around the same time and simultaneously subjected

her to cruelty.

14. The learned counsel for the complainant has refuted the

contention of the learned Senior counsel for the petitioners

and contended that at the stage of framing of the charge

only a prima facie case has to be made out and since the

learned MM has formed an opinion that a prima facie case

is made out against the present petitioners this revisionist

Court should not sit as a Court of Appeal and substitute its

own view in place of view expressed by the learned

Magistrate. The learned counsel has relied upon the

following judgments of the Apex Court in this regard :

15. So far as the learned APP for the State is concerned, he has

left it to the Court to decide the question as to whether the

charge can be framed against the present petitioners or

not.

16. I have carefully considered the respective submissions of

the learned counsel for the parties and gone through the

record as well as the impugned order. At the outset, I must

say that the learned Magistrate has grossly fallen into a

serious of error and committed a grave illegality by

directing the framing of charge against the present

petitioners by distinguishing the authorities referred to by

the petitioner.

17. There is no dispute about the fact that no two different

cases are similar. It has also been observed by the Apex

Court in Haryana Financial Corporation Vs. Jagdamba

Oil Mills AIR 2002 SC 834 that while applying the

principles of law laid down in a case, the Court should not

apply the law blindly or mathematically. It must analyze

the facts of the case in which such a law is laid down and

co-relate the same with the facts of the case where the

proposition of law is sought to be made applicable.

18. In the light of the aforesaid proposition if one examines the

authorities cited by the learned Senior Counsel one cannot

but agree that the proposition of law which is enunciated in

all these cases is that invariably whenever matrimonial

relations have turned sour there is a tendency on the part

of the complainant whether it is done by her of her own free

will or at the instigation of her parents, brothers, sisters or

even legal advice to make all kinds of wild and reckless

allegations against the entire family of the husband.

19. By such a conduct not only the gravity of the offence

against the husband who is the main accused gets diluted,

even the parents in law or other relative who are not

ordinarily living in a joint family are enroped and weakened

because she loses on her credibility. It is in this

background that in Mukesh Rani‟s case (supra), the

learned Single Judge of Punjab and Haryana High Court

has observed that

"whenever there is a matrimonial dispute between the husband and wife for the fault of husband other relations of the husband that is the brothers, sisters, parents are also roped in the litigation on the allegation of demand of dowry, whether they are living jointly or separate and sometimes even the parents who are aged 80 to 90 years and are unable to walk or talk and the sisters living at far off places in the matrimonial house are involved."

20. The learned Judge had shown the concern of the Court that

the provisions of Section 498A/304B IPC and the

presumptions which are permitted u/s 113A and 113B of

the Evidence Act, 1872 by the legislature in its wisdom, for

the protection of women, have been put to greater misuse

by the girl‟s side than to the actual use.

21. Similar is the observation in Anu Gill's case by the learned

Single Judge of our own High Court wherein the

proceedings against the sisters in law themselves were

quashed by the High Court. It is not correct on the part of

the learned Magistrate to observe that there were no

allegations against the sister in laws in Anu Gill‟s case and

therefore, the case was distinguishable. On the contrary,

admittedly there were allegations against the sister in law

which was considered to be totally vague, unworthy of

credence by the Court. The allegations which were made

by the complainant in Anu Gill's case was that the in-laws

of the complainant had demanded various gold items apart

from a sum of Rs.11 lacs from the complainant to meet the

requirement of the cash expenses for the "chuchak"

ceremony of Anu Gill by the parents of the husband.

22. The nature of allegations in the two cases are bound to be

different and merely because a generic term of „in-laws‟ was

used, it did not mean that the complainant in the reported

case did not make allegations against Anu Gill who would

also form part of „in-laws‟.

23. Another learned Single Judge of our own High Court in

case titled Savitri Devi Vs. Ramesh Chand 2003 (11) DMC

328 has again echoed the same sentiments of the Court

that though the provision in question has been made by the

good intentions of the legislature but implementation has

left a very bad taste and it has become counter productive

as there is a growing tendency amongst women to

perpetuate an action against the parents in law, relatives

irrespective of the fact whether they are minor school going

children, distant relatives. Because of the FIR having been

registered against them, they are made to run for protection

of their liberty.

24. In the light of the aforesaid concern which the different

Judges of different High Courts have shown from time to

time, one thing is very clear that as and when the relations

between husband and wife get strained, then allegations

are levelled not only against the husband but all his

relatives with a view to teach him a lesson.

25. I have purposely not referred to all the authorities cited by

the learned counsel for the petitioner because they are also

echoing almost the same sentiments.

26. Coming back to the facts of the present case, I feel that this

is precisely what has happened in the instant case also

that although the marriage had taken place in the month of

June, 2000, but the relations got strained may be on

account of alleged illegal demands having been made by the

husband or the relatives who were ordinarily living with

him in a joint family but certainly it is highly improbable to

assume that the married sisters of the husband of the

complainant who got married much prior to the marriage of

the complainant and were living in their own matrimonial

homes would come down simultaneously to the

matrimonial home of the complainant and subject her to

demand of dowry and the consequent cruelty. Therefore,

on this ground itself, I feel that the charge against the

present petitioners is not prima facie made out nor is any

„grave suspicion‟ to have summoned such an offence

available on record to put them to trial.

27. Even if it is assumed that the allegations as have been

made by the complainant are true on its face value even

then they do not fall within the mischief of Section 498A of

the IPC. A perusal of the impugned order shows that the

complainant had alleged against the petitioners that they

planted false stories or that they took out money from the

purse of the mother in law of the complainant and accused

complainant probably of stealing of the said money or that

the petitioners and her husband tied her twice in May in

order to compel her to bring Rs.5 lacs. So far as these two

allegations are concerned, they do not fall within the

mischief of cruelty as is enunciated in the explanation to

Section 498A of IPC. So far as explanation „a‟ is concerned,

it is willful conduct of such a nature which is likely to drive

a women to commit suicide or cause grave injury or danger

to her life whether mentally or physically which will

tentamount to cruelty and certainly this does not fall within

the said parameters. In explanation „b‟, there must be

harassment of the women with a view to coerce her and her

relations to unlawful demand and obviously a plain reading

of explanation „b‟ would show that there should be more

than one act, only then it will constitute harassment while

as in the instant case, there is no such allegations that

there were series of action to which the complainant was

subjected with a view to extract dowry either from her or

her parents or relations. On the contrary, the allegations

made in the complaint are vague, unspecified and

improbable as no date, time or place of any incident is

given. The same would be the fate of the allegation that the

petitioners along with the husband of the complainant had

tied her in May, 2000 in order to compel her to bring Rs.5

lacs from her father.

28. It is understandable or believable prima facie that her

husband might have tied her subjecting her to cruelty with

a view to demand dowry of Rs.5 lacs but extending the said

allegations qua the present petitioners who are admittedly

married sisters living separately in their own matrimonial

homes is absurd, unbelievable and not worthy of credence

and accordingly on merits also, I feel that the trial

Magistrate has fallen into a serious error which will result

in great mis-carriage of justice by directing the petitioners

to face the trial for an offence u/s 498A IPC.

29. I cannot refrain from mentioning that in a case of this

nature, the Court has to be very sensitive and it should not

get swayed by emotions which the complainant may be

suffering from with a view to put persons or relatives who

are totally unconnected with the incident to the facing of

the trial in itself in present times is a great deal of

punishment especially in the light of the fact that the same

continues endlessly for years together on account of heavy

load on the learned MM.

30. For the reasons mentioned above, I feel that the order dated

4.3.2008 passed by the learned Magistrate is not only

improper, illegal but also incorrect on appreciation of facts

as well as the application of law so as to warrant framing of

charge against the present petitioners for an offence u/s

498A IPC.

31. Accordingly, all the four petitioners are discharged.

32. Copy of this order be sent to the learned Trial Court for the

purpose of information.

V.K. SHALI, J.

DECEMBER 21, 2009 RN