The Supreme Court has reiterated that an offence of rape under Section 375 of the IPC is said made out on the grounds of a ‘false promise to marry’ only if it is established that the promise was made by the accused from the very beginning with no intention of fulfilling it, and was made solely to obtain consent for sexual relations. Crucially, the Apex Court has held that where the complainant is already married and thus legally barred from marrying the accused, a promise of marriage cannot serve as an inducement for sexual intercourse that vitiates consent.
The Apex Court strongly asserted that the law prohibits bigamous unions, and therefore, a promise to marry a person who already has a living spouse is legally unenforceable. In such circumstances, particularly when the complainant is aware of this legal impediment, she cannot claim that her consent was obtained under a ‘misconception of fact’, as the two contradictory facts, being married and being promised marriage, cannot coexist.
The Supreme Court therefore held that the offence alleged against the accused-appellant under Section 376(2)(n) of the IPC was not made out, even when taking the allegations in the FIR at face value. The Court found that it was not expedient or in the interest of justice to permit the prosecution to continue. Accordingly, the order of the High Court was set aside, and the FIR and the subsequent Chargesheet, and all proceedings arising from Sessions Case, were quashed.
A Two-Judge Bench of Justice B.V. Nagarathna and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan observed that the facts indicated a ‘classic case of a consensual relationship turning acrimonious’. It noted that the complainant is a thirty-three-year-old married woman, an advocate by profession, and not a naïve person incapable of making her own decisions.
The Bench therefore found it difficult to accept that the complainant, being an advocate, was oblivious to the settled legal position that a second marriage is prohibited while a first marriage subsists under both the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, and the Special Marriage Act, 1954. Therefore, any promise of marriage by the accused was not legally enforceable or capable of being acted upon, as the complainant herself was not eligible for marriage on the date of the alleged offences.
The Bench emphasized the disquieting tendency of converting failed or broken consensual relationships into criminal cases, stating that this not only trivializes the gravity of the offence of rape but also misuses the criminal justice machinery. It also mentioned that the complainant, as an advocate, should have exercised prudence before engaging the already burdened State machinery in what was essentially a personal dispute.
Briefly, the complainant-respondent No. 3, an advocate, was married in 2011 and had a son. Due to matrimonial discord, her husband filed for divorce, which was dismissed, and an appeal against this dismissal was pending. In the meantime, the complainant met the accused-appellant, also an advocate, and they developed a mutual liking. Later, the complainant lodged an FIR under Section 376(2)(n) of the IPC, alleging that the accused had raped her on a false promise of marriage.
The FIR stated that the accused, knowing about her pending divorce, took her to a friend’s house, raped her, and upon her protest, promised to marry her and applied vermilion to her head. Subsequently, they engaged in physical relations on his continued assurances of marriage. When she informed him of her pregnancy, he became evasive and forced her to have an abortion. When she confronted him and his family, she was allegedly assaulted.
The accused, in turn, filed a complaint against her for harassment and blackmail on the same day the FIR was lodged. The High Court granted the accused anticipatory bail but dismissed his petition to quash the FIR, leading to the filing of a chargesheet and the institution of a Sessions Case.
Appearances:
AOR Jugul Kishor Gupta, for the Appellant
DAG Praneet Pranav, Senior Advocate Rajesh Pandey, AORs Ravinder Kumar Yadav and Aswathi M.K., along with Advocates Vinayak Sharma, Kshitiz Aggarwal, Yashvardhan Shah, Ayushi Pandey, and Rishabh, for the Respondent
