Prayagraj : While quashing an FIR on cruelty and dowry, the Allahabad high court has warned against the misuse of criminal law in short-lived marriages.
The HC allowed the writ petition filed by Gaurav Jain and his family members and quashed a case registered at Hari Parvat police station, Commissionerate Agra, under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, and Sections 3 and 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961. The FIR alleged demands for Rs 10 crore and Rs 50 lakh, harassment, denial of food, threats, retention of stridhan and an attempt to strangle the wife. Underscoring the dangers of converting matrimonial discord into criminal prosecution, a division bench of Justice Chandra Dhari Singh and Justice Tarun Saxena quashed an FIR lodged in Agra alleging dowry harassment, physical assault and attempted strangulation. The court observed that general and omnibus allegations cannot justify the continuation of criminal proceedings in a short-term marriage. In a significant observation, the court warned that if every distressed or failed marriage is routinely converted into an FIR and subjected to the coercive machinery of criminal law, the institution of marriage will inevitably be affected at its core. The court noted that no domestic violence complaint, PCR call or contemporaneous police intervention concerning the alleged acts during the period of cohabitation had been brought on record. The court held that while the amounts mentioned might be precise, precision of amount is not the same as precision of conduct.
The court found that the allegations were vague and general, implicating the matrimonial family collectively without specifying the individual role of each accused. The court reiterated that a relationship cannot substitute for an overt act and that general allegations against relatives, without specific roles, do not justify the continuation of criminal proceedings. The court stated that indiscriminate criminalisation deepens conflict and transforms the home into a litigious battleground, destroying any residual possibility of reconciliation or amicable separation. It cautioned that the fear of disproportionate and sweeping criminal allegations creates a chilling effect on families and dilutes the moral gravity of criminal law, turning penal statutes into instruments of leverage in civil or matrimonial disputes.