During a time when women’s crimes are increasing by the day, some women tend to misuse the justice being offered to them in case of an incident as the law has got tougher against criminals assaulting females. In a bizarre incident, a woman was fined a charge of Rs. 25,000 for registering a fake rape case against a man, who was later found to be her boyfriend, by the Bombay High Court.
The Court ordered the fine after raising suspicions as the petitioner pleaded the court to quash the case, saying that she did not want to indulge or take it further.
Justices R D Dhanuka and V G Bisht, the panel forming the decision-taking bench, in view of the fake case, told the woman to deposit the amount in the Maharashtra Police Welfare Fund in a span of four weeks since the date of dismissing the case. The court further said that the consequences of not paying the fine could lead to the FIR against the man remaining valid.
The tale began on March 16th, 2020 when the woman filed a complaint at the Nalasopara police station situated in Palghar district of Mumbai. The FIR mentioned that a man had raped her after drugging her to make her lose consciousness.
However, the twist in the case occurred when the woman reached the High Court of Bombay to withdraw the case with a reason that her complaint was due to the pressure from her family.
According to the complainant, the man she had accused was actually her boyfriend and they were in a relationship. Nevertheless, when the relationship got exposed in front of the family, she made up a false narrative including that he had raped her.
Not giving in to the plea from the woman, ArunaKamatPai, the additional public prosecutor told the media that the cops are still probing the matter and will go on to file a charge sheet against the man.
In case the woman has lied and the court decides to accept her plea on withdrawing the case, she said that the petitioner must be charged a heavy fine for lodging a fake rape case complaint.
The Bombay High Court agreed on the matter and decided to accept the suggestion put forth by Ms. Aruna. It said, “In our view, the case of the petitioner cannot be accepted simpliciter that the complaint was filed by her due to pressure from her family members.”
It further directed, “However, since the petitioner does not want to pursue the complaint, we are inclined to quash the FIR but on the condition that the petitioner pays Rs 25,000 to the Maharashtra Police Welfare Fund within four weeks.”
