G V RAO Vs. L H V PRASAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Special Leave Petition was dismissed by us on 4-10-1999. We, hereinbelow, give our reasons for dismissing the Special Leave petition.

(2.) The petitioner is a Post-Doctoral fellow at Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad. He invited marriage proposals for himself through advertisement in Deccan Chronicle dated 27th of January, 1994, in pursuance of which respondent No. 1 approached the petitioner and furnished the particulars of respondent No. 4 who is his sister. It was represented by respondent No. 1 that respondent No. 4 was born on 29th of June, 1966 and they belonged to Thurupukapu Community. The petitioner himself gave out that he belonged to Gujala Balija Community which was a forward community and, therefore, he wanted a wife from a forward community. The parents of respondent No. 4, who are respondents 2 to 3 in this petition, met the parents of the petitioner and they talked and the marriage proposal was finalised. Betrothol ceremony took place on 27th of June, 1994 and later the marriage took place on 19-8-1994. On 4th of March, 1997, the petitioner allegedly, came to know that respondents 1 to 4 belonged to Kondakapu Community, which was a Scheduled Tribe, and it was then that he realised that by misrepresenting themselves as members of Thurupukapu Community, they had lured the petitioner into wedlock, for which the petitioner would not have agreed at all, had he known that the respondents did not belong to Thurupukapu Community but belonged to Kondakapu Community. It was in these circumstances that he filed a complaint in the Court on 10-7-1996 under Sections 415, 419, 420 read with Section 34, I.P.C. which was referred to Station House Officer, Police Station Alwal, Rangareddy District, Andhra Pradesh for investigation and report. Since the investigation was considerably delayed, the petitioner filed Writ Petition No. 11477 of 1997 in the High Court for a Writ of Mandamus directing the Station House Officer to expedite the investigation. While the writ petition was pending, an affidavit was filed by the Station House Officer that after completing the investigation, he had submitted the chargesheet in the Court on 28-5-1997 against the respondents. The respondents, however, approached the High Court through a petition under Section 482, Cr. P.C. seeking the quashing of the FIR which was allowed by the impugned judgment and it is in these circumstances that this petition has been filed in this Court. Learned counsel for the petitioner has contended that the High Court was not justified in quashing the complaint (FIR) as a chargesheet had already been submitted after the investigation and a prima facie case was made out against the respondents. He has further contended that the High Court was wrong in its interpretation of Section 415, I.P.C.

(3.) Before considering the contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner on merits, we may state another important fact that the petitioner himself is facing a case under Section 498-A, I.P.C. instituted by the respondents against him. It is stated in the petition that this prosecution was launched by the respondents against the petitioner as a counter-blast to the notice dated 13-6-1995 which was issued by him to respondent No. 1 as to why he had misrepresented about his caste and why had he represented to the petitioner that he belonged to Thurupukapu Community instead of Kondakapu Community.