Parties Entered Into Agreement To Live Together & Mutually Cancelled It By Another Deed: Gujarat High Court Upholds Acquittal In Rape By False Promise To Marry Case
The Gujarat High Court was considering a Petition challenging an order of acquittal passed in favor of the accused booked under Sections 376, 376(2)(n) and 323 of the IPC.
Justice Ilesh J. Vora, Justice R.T. Vachhani, Gujarat High Court
The Gujarat High Court has upheld an order granting acquittal to a man booked in a case of rape on the premise of a false promise of marriage after considering the fact that the parties entered into a written agreement by mutual consent to live together, and thereafter, by another deed, mutually cancelled it.
The High Court was considering a Petition challenging an order of acquittal passed in favour of the respondent-accused, who was booked under Sections 376, 376(2)(n) and 323 of the Indian Penal Code.
The Bench comprising Justice Ilesh J. Vora and Justice R. T. Vachhani held, “The present case is not one of a promise to marry made with a dishonest intention from the very inception, so as to obtain sexual favours under the guise of such a promise. Here, the parties entered into a written agreement by mutual consent to live together, and thereafter, by another deed, mutually cancelled it. The prosecutrix, being a major, resided with the respondent of her own consent, and the case therefore cannot be brought within the ambit of rape on the premise of a false promise of marriage.”
Advocate Rishabh R Jain represented the Appellant while Additional Public Prosecutor Lb Dabhi represented the Respondent.
Factual Background
The complainant-victim was pursuing her studies in the second year at a college. She and the respondent-accused were in a relationship for about a year before the incident. The respondent-accused was employed at a showroom. According to the complainant, one day she went to the house of the respondent-accused, and both of them thereafter presented themselves at a police station. It was alleged that the respondent-accused was of a tender age, and a mutual agreement came to be executed between the two. The respondent-accused allegedly induced her with a promise to marry him upon attaining the marriageable age and kept her with him.
For about two months, they resided at his house, during which period he allegedly established physical relations with her forcibly, on the false promise of marriage, and assaulted her whenever she refused. The respondent-accused told her that they would marry on her birthday, and asked her to get the agreement cancelled. When she refused, he threatened to take his own life. Frightened by the threat, the agreement was cancelled by mutual consent. The respondent thereafter took her on a motorcycle and left her on the road. She returned to her father’s house by auto-rickshaw and, accompanied by her father, lodged the complaint.
Reasoning
On a perusal of the facts of the case, the Bench noted that the appellant prosecutrix entered into a deed of understanding with the contesting respondent. It was noticed that at the time of executing the said deed, the respondent was 20 years of age. They decided to live together of their own volition, without any coercion or pressure on the part of any third person. The Bench also noted that the subsequent deed of understanding, by which the parties themselves cancelled the earlier friendship agreement, recorded that they had lived together by mutual consent, differences in temperament had arisen, and they had decided to part of their own free will, without any pressure or threat.
“This contemporaneous document, executed at the very end of the period alleged in the charge, contains no recital of any beating, any threat to die, or any forcible intercourse, and is wholly consistent with the admissions of the prosecutrix’s father and uncle that she had gone and stayed with the accused of her own will and that the agreement stood cancelled”, it added.
The Bench was of the view that their relationship was based on valid consent considering their long-drawn relationship, including the circumstances of their living together and cohabiting with each other, that too in separate rented accommodation with the knowledge of the parents of the prosecutrix.
According to the Bench, the statement and allegations with regard to the prosecutrix having been subjected to sexual assault and also the compulsion and harassment so as to get extracted the deed of cancellation by applying force did not inspire much confidence and had rightly been negated. “And therefore, any break-up and subsequent events, which otherwise may not give an inference or finding in favour of the prosecutrix, is no ground to subject the respondent for the offence of rape”, the Bench held while dismissing the Petition.
Cause Title: XYZ Victim v. State Of Gujarat (Case No.: R/CR.A/2273/2026)