The Supreme Court quashed a dowry harassment case, criticizing the rising trend of wives naming multiple in-laws without clear evidence. It stressed the need for specific and genuine allegations in such matters.
New Delhi – The Supreme Court of India has quashed a dowry harassment case filed by a woman against her husband’s relatives, including his parents and sister, while noting a rising trend where wives are naming several of the husband’s family members in such cases without strong proof.
The bench, comprising Justices Ahsanuddin Amanullah and Prashant Kumar Mishra, remarked that in this particular case, the accusations made by the complainant were not specific or detailed. They stated that for them, it looked like there were only “omnibus and general allegations” against the husband, his parents, and his sister. The court found no claims of physical abuse by the accused, which is often a significant factor in dowry harassment cases.
The court explained that the only allegations made were regarding mental harassment. The complainant had accused the family of using their political influence to pressure her for more dowry.
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The bench said,
“The allegation is only of taunt and statement that they are highly placed having political influence and connection with ministers as such they instigated accused 1 (husband) to accused 3 (husband’s parents) to pressurize the de-facto complainant to get additional dowry.”
In its order, the Supreme Court highlighted that this kind of pattern—of including multiple relatives without clear evidence—has been seen more often in recent years.
It added,
“Considering the growing trend of the dowry victim arraigning the relatives of the husband, this court has deprecated the practice involving the relatives of the husband for the offence under Section 498A IPC and Section 4 of Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961.”
The bench also referred to several previous judgments where the same concern had been raised. The court repeated its view on this issue and said it had consistently discouraged such practice.
Referring to its decisions, the bench said it,
has reiterated and deprecated the practice of involving the relatives of the husband in dowry related matters.”
This particular case dates back to a marriage that took place in 2014 in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh. After only five months of marriage, the wife left her husband and went back to live with her parents. She did return for a short while but then left again.
Following this, the husband sent her a legal notice and filed a petition in 2015 for restitution of conjugal rights, which means he wanted her to return and continue the marital relationship. However, during the legal process, the woman filed a police complaint in 2016 accusing the husband and his family of dowry harassment.
Later, a compromise was reached between the two sides, and the husband withdrew the case he had filed. After that, the woman left for the United States without informing her husband or any of his family members.
The marital dispute did not end there. On June 21, 2016, the husband filed a petition for divorce. In response to this, the woman again approached the police and filed a fresh complaint, this time naming six people, including her husband and his relatives. The current appeal was filed by some of those accused persons.
After carefully reviewing all the facts and evidence, the Supreme Court decided to quash the dowry harassment case against the husband’s relatives. It emphasized that merely being relatives of the husband does not make someone guilty in such cases unless there are specific and strong allegations.
This judgment is another example of the Supreme Court’s growing concern over the misuse of laws related to dowry harassment and its firm stand against vague and baseless complaints that include several members of the husband’s family without proper justification.
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