The High Court · 2025

4. Smt. Ayesha Begum, W/o lmran age. 30 years, Caste. Muslim, Occu. House wife, r/o H.No 7-150/1, ltrlarlu. Mahabubr(agar.

5. Md. lmran, S/o Md. Mahamood. age. 33 years, Caste. Muslim, Occu. Junior Asst DCB Bank, Mahabubnagar H. No 3-60, Rahcala Village ofAddakal Mandal.

6. Shaheen Begum, D/o Gulam Gouse age. 26 years, Caste. Muslim, Occ- Private Teacher Rl/o H.No 7-15011, Madu, lvlahabubnaga

7. Shaik Subhan, S/o Gulam Gouse. age.32 years, Caste. Muslim, Student, Rl/o H.No 7-1 50/1, Marlu, IVahabubnagar. ...PETITIONERS/ACCUSED No.1 to 7 AND

1. State of Telangana, Rep by the Public Prosecutor High Court at Hyderabad 2. Haseena Begum, W/o Gouse Pasha Aged about 26 years. Occ- Student R/o H.No-1-3-1 1416/1 . Rajendra nagar Mahabub Nagar. Telangana ...RESPONDENTS/COMPLAINANTS Petition under Section 528 of BNSS praying that in the circumstances stated in the Memorandum of Grounds of Criminal Petition, the High Court may be pleased to quash the impugned proceedings in C.C.No. 331 of 2024 on the file of the Court of the Judicial Magistrate of First Class at Mahabubnagar as against the Petitioners (A-1 to A-7) herein. t.A. NO:2 OF 2024 Petition under section 52g of BNSS praying that ir the circumstances stated in the Memorandum of Grounds of criminal pelition, t-r r High corrt .uv u. pleased to stay all further proceedings in c.c.No. 641 of 2c z+ on tne fite oi the court of the Judiciar Magistrate of First crass at MahabuL r ?gar as ugrin"i ir.," Petitioners (A- 1 to A-7) herein. This Petition coming on for hearing, u Grounds of Criminal petition and upon heari JANGEM, Advocate for the petitioner and Additional Public prosecutor on behalf of B.Srinivas appeared for the Respondent No.2. pon perusing re Memorandum of ng the argurrr rts of Sri RAKESH Sri M.Rama: randra Reddy, the the Resporrr ent No.1 and Srr The Court made the following: ORDER IN THE HIGH COURT FOR THE STATE OF TELANGANA AT HYDERABAD THE HON'BLE SMT. JUSTICE JUWADISRIDEVI CRIMINAL PETITION No.9405 OF 2024 17TH DECEMBER,2025 Between: Gouse Pasha and 6 others Petitioners AND The State of Telangana Rep. through Public Prosecutor and 1 other ... Respondents ORDER This Criminal Petition is filed by the petitioners-accused Nos.'l to 7 to quash the proceedings against them in C.C.No.331 of 2024 on the file of Judicial Magistrate of First Class at Mahabubnagar. The offences alleged against the petitioners are under Section 498-A read with 109 of the lndian Penal Code (for short 'lPC') and sections 3 and 4 of Dowry Prohibition Act (for short 'D.P.Act') and section 4 of the Muslim (women protection of rights on marriage) Act 2019 (for short'the Act')

2. Heard M/s. Rakesh Jangem, learned counsel for the petitioners and Mr.B.Srinivas, learned counsel for respondent No.2 and l I 2 Sri Ir/.Ramachandra Reddy, learned Additional pukrl c prosecutor for the State Perused the record

3. The case of the prosecution is that the \ccused No.1 is the husband of the defacto complainant and Accused N r .2 to 7 are relatives. Marriage of accused No.1 with defacto complainart was solemnized on 21 .05.2023. At the time of her marriage, her parents presentecl Rs 3,00,000/-through RTGSfrom Union Bankof ln: a on 4th May, 2023 and other house hold articles to her husband as dorry. Thereafter some disputes took place between the petitioners and def;;fo complainant ano the petitioners also demanded additional dowry. Sulsequenfly, she was abandoned from the house. Later, when the defacl complainant came to her in laws house to see her husband, she was rot allowed into the house and after her husband came to the house frorr outside, he abused and pushed her and shouted Talaq-Talaq-Talaq. Ht: rce, the respondent No.2 filed the present case for the offences under iection 49g-A read with 1 09 of IPC and section 3 and 4 of D. p.Act and s t ction 4 of the Act

4. Learned counsel for petitioners subnr s that the police investigated and filed charge sheet against the petii oners-A1 to 43 by deleting the petitioners-A4 to 47. petitioner-accused ,,1o.4 is the sister of 41, petitioner-accused No.5 is the brother in law of \1 and husband of 3 44, petitioner-accused No.6 is sister of A1 , petitioner-accused No.7 is brother of 41. But, the learned Magistrate has ordered for re_ investigation. Learned counsel submitted that the learned Magistrate has no jurisdiction to order re-investigation and praced reriance upon a judgment passed by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Vinay Tyagi v. lrshad Ali @ Deepak and others,, wherein in paras 2g and 30 it was held as under-

28. The next question that comes up for consideration of this Court is whether the empowered Magistrate has the jurisdiction to direct .further investigation" or ,,fresh investigation". As far as the latter is concerned, the law declared by this Court consistently is that the learned Magistrat| has no jurisdiction to direct "f.esh. or "de novo" investigation. However, once the report is filed, the Magistrate has juisdiction to accept the report or reject the same right at the threshold. Even after accepting the repoft, it has the juisdiction to discharge the accused or frame the charge and put him to tiat. But there are no provisions in the Code which empower the Magistrate to disturb the status of an accused pending investigation or when repoft is fited to wipe out the report and its effects in taw. Reference in this regard can be made to K.Chandrasekhar v. Stafe of Kerala2, Ramachandran v. R.udhayakumaf , Nirmat Singh Kahlon y. Sfafe of punjaba, Mithabhai ' (zot:) s scc zez ' lrssay s scc zzs: 199s scc (cri) 1291 ' (zooa) s scc ar:: (2008) 2 scc (cri) 631 '(2009) l SCC 441: (2009) l SCC (Cri) s23 .! 4 Pashabhai patet v. Slate of Gujarat and Babubhai v. Sfafe of Gujarat'. 30. The power of the coutt to pass an oR er for further investigation has been a matter of i, diciat concern for some time now. The Coutl;; have taken somewhat divergent but not aiame,t icZti opposite views in this regard. Such views ; n bL reconciled and harmoniously applied w thottt ulolation of the_ rule of precedence. ln S,i te of Punjab v. CBl7, the Courl noticed the dist;r ction that exists between ,,reinvestigation,, and ,,1 rlher investigation". The CoutI also noticerl the settled principle that the coutts subord nate to the High Court do not have the statt tory inherent powers as fhe High Court ,loes under Section 492 of the Code ana there ore, must exercise their jurisdiction within the four corners of the Code. Hence, the same is non esf in the eye of law : rd prayed to quash the proceedings against the accused Nos. 4 to 7. 5 Learned counser for the petitioners furthe- submits that the petitioners/accused Nos.2 and 3 are father and mot rer of Al and they are nothing to do with the areged offences and that * ey never harassed the respondent No.2 and never demanded any dowry fr m respondent No.2 or from her parents. There are no specific aregations agli inst the petitioners_ accused Nos'2 and 3. The contents of the compraint or r harge sheet do not '1zoos1 o scc:z:1zoo9) 2 scc (cri) 1047 - l.2O7O) L2 scc 254: (2011) 1 SCC (Cri) 336 ' (2011) 9 sCC 182: (2011) fl ScC (Cri)666 5 disclose the required ingredients to attract the offences, as alleged in the charge sheet

6. While seeking to quash the criminal proceedings against the petitioners-accused Nos.2 and 3, learned counsel for the petitioners relied upon a decision in Dara Lakshmi Narayana and others v. State of Telangana and anothel, wherein the Honourable Supreme Court of lndia at Paragraph Nos.18, 24, 31 and 32 held that: "!!. A bare perusal of the FIR shows that the allegations made by respondent No.2 are vague and omnibus. Other than claiming that appellant No.7 harassed her and that appellant Nos.2 to 6 instigated him to do so, respondent No.2 has not provided any specific details or descibed any particular instance of harassment. She has a/so not mentioned the time, date, place, or manner in which the alleged harassment occurred. Therefore, the FIR lacks concrete and precise allegations. 24. lnsofar as appellant Nos.2 to 6 are concerned, we find that they have no connection to the matter at hand and have been dragged into the web of cime without any rhyme or reason. A perusal of the FIR would indicate that no substantial and specific allegations have been made against appellant Nos.2 to 6 other than stating that they used to instigate appellant No.1 for demanding more dowry. /t is a/so an admitted fact that they never resided with the couple namely appellant No.l and respondent No.2 and their children. Appellant Nos.2 and 3 resided together at Guntakal, Andhra Pradesh. Appellant t zozq ntsc 9s3 5 Nos. 4 to 6 tive in Neilore, Bengaluru an: Guntur respectively. 31 . Further, this Couft in preetiGupfa s Sfafe of Jharkhand (2010) 7 SCC 662 hetct that the courts have to be extremely car,:1tl and cautious in dealing with these complit nts and must take pragmatic realties into cons:t leration while deating with matrimonial cas( s The allegations of harassment by the h,_sband,s close relatives who had been living in lifferent cities and never visited or rarety vi:;,.ed the place where the complainant reside, woutd have an entirely different complexio t The allegations of the complainant are req,t irecl to be scrutinized with great car, and circumspection. 32. We, therefore, are of the opinion f,,at the impugned FIR No.g2 of 2022 fited by res,:ndent No.2 was initiated with ulterior *oiiu"" it seff/e personal scores and grudges against a,:rcllant his famity members i.e., ar,:rcllant Nos.2 to 6 herein. Hence, the present : rse af hand falls within category g) of illt:trative parameters highlighted in Bhajan Lal. The.efore, the High Couft, in the present case, erred in not e_xercising the powers available to it under Section 482 CrpC and thereby failed to pl"uurt abuse of the Couft's process by continul g the criminal prosecution against the appeilants.i -and No.1 7 Learned counsel for the respondent No.12 as well as learned Additionar pubric prosecutor for the state submil:d that there are specific allegations against the petitioners and the truth or othenvise 7 would come out only after conducting full-fledged trial by the concerned Court below and prayed to dismiss this Criminal Petition.

8. A perusal of the record discloses that upon investigation, the police filed charge sheet on 07.12.2023 against A1 to 43 by deleting the names of 44 to ,A7 since the offences against A4 to A7 were not proved But the learned Magistrate of trial Court vide Dis.No.565, dated

2604.2024, has directed the SHO of women PS to reinvestigate the case and file report before the said Court. Upon which, the complaint was investigated and charge sheet was filed by the police on 05.O7.2024 vide crime No.73 of 2023 taking cognizance of the alleged offences against all the accused herein. So far as, petitioners-accused Nos.4 to 7 are concerned, the learned Magistrate has no jurisdiction to direct re- investigation and empowered only for further investigation but cannot direct re-investigation. Hence, the cognizance of offences against the petitioners-accused Nos.4 to 7 is non esf in the eye of law. Coming to the accused Nos.2 and 3, who are in laws of the defacto complainant, there are no specific instances with regard to the harassment meted out by the accused Nos. 2 and 3. Only vague and omnibus allegations are made against the petitioners-accused Nos.2 and 3. Further, the accused No.1 and defacto complainant are residing separately and no material was placed by the prosecution with regard to specific instances against the I petitioners-accused Nos.2 and 3. The responc ent No.2 roped the petitioners in the present case only to harass therr bsing the parents of the accused No.1, though there are no specific c ,rert acts established against the petitioners

9. Except stating that there was a rr ental and physical harassment caused by the accused, there are ro specific details cr descriptive particurars of instances of harassment caus 3d by the petitioners_ accused Nos.2 and 3. Such generalised and r; veeping accusations unsupported by concrete evidence or particularised a ll )gattons basis for criminal prosecution. cannot forn, 10 Making vague and generarised aregatiorr: during matrimonial confricts, if not scrutinized, wi, read to the misuse of reg ar processes and an encouragement for use of arm twisting tactics by a wi -= and/or her famiry. sometimes, recourse is taken to invoke section 4ggA .1 the lpc against the husband and his famiry in order to seek compriance v'i h the unreasonabre demands of a wife. Therefore, the courts are bound to e rsure whether there is any prima facie case against the husband and his farr iry members before prosecuting the husband and his famiry members. Hr-, rce, the petitioners cannot be dragged into criminal prosecution and the same would be abuse of process of raw in the absence of speciflc aregations made , rgainst them. ffi,/ 9

11. ln view of the facts and circumstances of the case including the settled principle of law laid down by the Honourable Supreme Court of India in the above decisions cited supra, this Court is of the considered opinion that the continuation of the proceedings against the petitioners-accused Nos.2 to 7 amounts to abuse of process of law, therefore, the proceedings against the petitioners-accused Nos 2 to 7 are liable to be quashed.

12. Accordingly, this Criminal Petition is parfly allowed. The proceedlngs against the petitioners-accused Nos.2 to 7 in C.C No.331 of 2024 on the file of Judicial Magistrate of First Class at Mahabubnagar, are hereby quashed. However, the trial Court is directed to proceed with the trial against the petitioner-accused No.1. As a sequel, pending miscellaneous applications, if any, shall stand V. HARI PRASAD DEPUTY REGISTRAR I /ITRUE COPY// SECTION OFFICER closed To,

1. The Judicial Magistrate of First Class at Mahabubnagar i. in. !i"tl"" uoriu omt"t, Woman Police Station Mahabubnagar 3. rwo ccs to the tr"tiffitioi'iltjri;R; iigh co"t at Hvderabad' (oUr) + O"" CC to Snf RAKESH JANGEM Advocate [OPUC] 5. Two CD CoPies t.- TPK IM HIGH COURT JS,J DATED: 1711212025 a. o \ 22 ttt rW 1 \, ^.-^ ORDER CRLP.No.9405 of 2024 CRIMINAL PETITION IS PARTLY ALL OWED Y/ ?"