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Court referred to the top court’s ruling that since second marriage, during subsistence of a valid first marriage will be null and void, therefore, no case under Section 498A IPC would be maintainable
A division bench of the Chhattisgarh High Court recently held that a complaint or FIR lodged by a man’s second wife for offence under Section 498-A, IPC would not be tenable.
The division bench of Justices Sanjay K. Agrawal and Justice Sachin Singh Rajput relied on the Supreme Court’s ruling in Shivcharan Lal Verma & Another v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2007) where a three judge bench of the top court had held that marriage of the appellant with his second wife, during subsistence of a valid marriage with first wife, was null and void. Consequently, the top court had quashed the conviction of the appellant for Section 498-A IPC.
The matter before the high court pertained to a petition filed by three people who sought direction to quash a case lodge under Section 498-A IPC against them.
The case was that the complainant woman got married to a man in 2018 who was already married. Soon after the marriage of the complainant, she alleged that her husband and his first wife along with other family members started harassing her and treating her with cruelty. As a result, the woman filed a case in 2021 for offence under Section 498A IPC read with Section 34 IPC against her husband, his first wife and other family members.
When the matter was being heard before a single judge bench, it found conflict with the decision rendered by the top court in the matter of Shivcharan Lal Verma & Another v. State of Madhya Pradesh and Rajinder Singh v. State of Punjab. Therefore, the single judge bench referred the matter to the Chief Justice for answering the question: "Whether the complaint/FIR lodged by the second wife for commission of offence punishable under Section 498-A of the I.P.C. would be tenable or not?"
The Chief Justice placed the matter before the division bench which answered that such a case would not be tenable.
The division bench found that there was no conflict in the two decisions as the first matter pertained to the issue of case under Section 498A IPC by a man’s second wife, whereas, the second matter pertained to applicability of Section 2 of the of the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961.
In view of the same, court answered that such a case by the second wife would not be maintainable and accordingly, ordered the matter to be placed before the single judge bench for deciding the petitioner’s plea to quash the case lodged against them.
Case Title: Suman Sharma and 2 Others v. State and 2 Others
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