The Bombay High Court has quashed a case against a 73-year-old man accused of sexually abusing a woman since 1987 citing it to be a relationship with mutual consent. A division bench comprising Justices AS Gadkari and Neela Gokhale held that the contents of the First Information Report indicated a consensual relationship rather than an abusive one.
It took cognizance of the fact that no reasons were assigned in the FIR, filed in 2018, for the inordinate delay in filing the complaint. “The parties were indulging in a sexual relationship for as many as 31 years.
The complainant has never breathed a word about her alleged objection to the relationship,” the court underlined, pointing out that their long-term relationship was consensual. The judges termed the situation as “a classic case of a relationship between the parties turning sour and thereafter the complainant lodging a police complaint.”
The woman started working at the man’s company in 1987, during which time the accused allegedly forced her into a sexual relationship. The prosecution claimed that the accused raped her in various hotels at Kalyan, Bhiwandi, and other places during a period of 30 years. She claims the accused promised to marry her, put a ‘mangalsutra’ around her neck in 1993, and declared her as his second wife. He also allegedly prevented her from marrying anyone else.
She further informed that in the year 1996, the accused had a heart attack, because of which she managed the company. However, in September 2017, her mother was diagnosed with cancer, owing to which she had to take leave. When she came back to work, she found the office closed and the company gate locked.
When she contacted the man again, he refused to marry her and kept back all important documents including banking, income tax, medical shop agreement, and the gold ‘mangalsutra’. He refused even to meet her.
The bench found that the FIR revealed that the woman knew full well the fact that the accused was a married man, yet she continued to have trust in his promise to marry her. “She is adult enough to know the law forbids a second marriage, and there is no allegation in the complaint that the accused promised to divorce his first wife and then marry her. Even otherwise, this would purely be wishful thinking on the part of the woman that the accused will marry her after divorcing his existing wife,” the court stated.
The judges were of the view that a fair amount of opportunity had been availed by the woman to come out of the relationship and file a complaint against the accused during the past 31 years, which she did not exercise. Coupled with this, they concluded further undermining the credibility of the allegations.