The Bombay High Court dismissed a woman’s plea seeking to reopen a rape and criminal intimidation case against JSW Group MD Sajjan Jindal. The Court held that once the complainant accepted the closure report and declined to pursue the case, no further interference was warranted.
Mumbai: The Bombay High Court has dismissed a petition filed by a 32-year-old woman who sought to reopen a rape and criminal intimidation case against Sajjan Jindal, Chairman and Managing Director of the JSW Group.
The Court refused to interfere with an earlier order of a magistrate court that had accepted a police closure report and closed the case.
A Division Bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam A. Ankhad passed the order on December 24 while rejecting the woman’s criminal writ petition.
The petition had challenged an April 24, 2024 order of the Metropolitan Magistrate at Bandra, which had accepted a B-summary (closure) report filed by the police in the FIR registered at the Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) police station.
The FIR had accused Sajjan Jindal of offences under Sections 376 (rape), 354 (outraging modesty) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code. Jindal had consistently denied the allegations, calling them false and baseless.
During investigation, the police filed a closure report stating that the allegations were not supported by evidence.
The report highlighted that there was a considerable delay in filing the complaint. It also recorded that despite being given several opportunities, the complainant did not appear to record her statement under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure before a magistrate.
The investigating officer further placed hotel records and travel details on record to show that Sajjan Jindal was not present at the Taj Lands End, Bandra, or at other places mentioned in the FIR on the dates claimed by the woman.
Based on this material, and an affidavit filed by the complainant herself expressing her inability to pursue the case and stating that she had no objection to the B-summary report, the magistrate allowed the police request to close the case.
The woman later approached the Bombay High Court seeking to set aside the magistrate’s order. She asked for the investigation to be reopened and transferred either to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) or to a Special Investigation Team under court monitoring. She also requested directions to the police to file a charge sheet within three months.
In her plea, the petitioner claimed that Sajjan Jindal was a “powerful man with political support” and alleged that the police had failed to safeguard her interests after the FIR was registered.
However, the High Court rejected these arguments and held that there was very limited scope for interference in such matters, especially when the complainant herself had stated that she did not wish to pursue the case and had not objected to the closure report.
The Bench observed,
“The Magistrate who deals with the police report cannot compel the police to change his opinion. A finding of fact recorded in the police report could not have been doubted by the Magistrate when the prosecutrix herself made a statement that she did not want to contest the matter,”
The Court also took note of the personal background of the petitioner, recording that she is a highly educated medical professional. The Bench described her as a multi-talented young woman and observed that she had made conscious and informed choices in her interactions with the accused.
The judges further noted that the petitioner had not alleged that the accused had acted deceitfully or misled her into any situation.
“She doesn’t allege that the accused person on some false pretext took her to the washroom…All that the petitioner says is that the accused person told her a sob story of his marital life and promised that they would live as husband and wife in some other country. But then the petitioner herself says that she was not agreeable to such a proposal. In these circumstances, the petitioner must be held to have made a conscious and informed choice…Some of the WhatsApp chats produced by her on record may give an impression that she was passionate about the accused person.”
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The Bench stressed that it is the duty of the police to independently form an opinion on whether a criminal case is made out based on the evidence collected during investigation. The Court concluded that there was no legal basis to reopen the case or to order a fresh investigation.
Accordingly, the High Court held that the writ petition had no merit and dismissed it.
Advocate Rahul Arote appeared on behalf of the petitioner, while Public Prosecutor M. M. Deshmukh represented the State of Maharashtra.
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