Anil Chauhan
A couple (accused and victim) has jointley filed a petiitin in Bombay High Court seeking guidelines to ensure that people are not booked under false charges of rape after a love affair turns sour. The petitioners gave example of their own case in which police had wrongly recorded statement of the girl alleging that her boyfriend had raped her. While denying the rape charge, the girl said she was in love with the boy only.
The petitioners (20-year-old girl and his 34-year-old boyfriend) were involved as complainant and accused respectively in a rape case which was recently quashed by the division bench comprising of Justice V. M. Kanade and Justice Smt. Nutan Prabhudessai of the Bombay high court on December 7, 2016 after the girl denied the rape charge. The petition is listed for hearing on the January 11, 2017 and will be argued by a team of lawyers led by Mahesh Vaswani, Swapna Kode, Dharini Nagda, Manashi Mahanta and Amala Salvi.
Earlier, girl has filed FIR agaisnt her boyfriend (second petitioner) in Khar police station in March 2015 after she realized that he was married and his promises of marrying her were false. The girl wanted to register FIR of cheating but police registred FIR under sections 376 (rape), 377(unnatural offences) and 417(cheating) of the Indian Penal Code.
The boy approached Bomhay High Court seeking FIR to be quashed through his lawyer Mahesh Vaswani. Last week High Court quashed the FIR (copy available with ABI) after the girl denied the rape charge.
The girl also realized that boy was incorrectly booked under charges of rape. She approached investigation officer and sought further recording of her statement. The investigation officer denied her request as chargesheet was already filed in the matter.
“Yes girl and boy have filed petition seeking guidelines to prevent abuse of the law and saving lives of innocent people from being ruined with a stigma of a rape case, just because a love relationship has gone sour,” said Mahesh Vaswani. “The petitioner sprayed that the victims may be permitted to record their statements in English or Hindi as against in Marathi language,” added Vaswani.
The couple has also pleaded that arrests in such cases should be deferred when the accused are ready to cooperate in the investigation.