A MARTHAMMA Vs. A MUNUSWAMY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a petn. for setting aside the discharge of the three accused in C. C. No. 3917 of 1949 on the file of the 5th Presidency Mag., Madras. They had all been complained against Under Sections 494, 495 & 496 read With Section 109, I. P. C. by the petnr. Mrs. Marthammal, & were discharged by the learned Presidency Mag. Under Section 253(1), Cr. P. C.

(2.) The facts were briefly these. The petnr. Mrs. Marthammal, was a Christian School mistress, aged 29, in September 1943, when she met the first accused, Munuswami, a Hindu student just past 18. She fell madly in love with him & began to have sexual intercourse with him. Her father & brother chided her for thus misconducting herself. Later on, she & her father & brother arranged with the first accused that he should become a Christian & marry the petnr. & thus regularise the illicit relationship between him & the petnr. On 9-4-1944, the first accused, Munuswami, was baptised & converted to Christianity by Rev. Moses, P. W. 4, in the Perambur Telugu Baptist Church. P. W. 3, the Deacon of the Church, was also present at the conversion. No intimation was sent to the boy's parents or relatives, who apparently did not know anything at all about his illicit intercourse with the petnr. or his intention to marry her after becoming a Christian, or even the fact of his knowing the petnr. On 17-4-1944, 8 days after the conversion, the first accused was married to the petnr. in the same church in the presence of P. Ws. 2, 3, 4 & 6, all Christians. Again, no information about the marriage was sent to the relatives of the first accused, & not one of them was present. The evidence showed that none of the relatives of the first accused ever knew that the first accused had become a Christian or had been baptised or had married the petnr. After living together for some time, the first accused & the petnr. got estranged, in 1946, & the first accused was living away from the petnr. for some time. The petnr. then wrote to him several pathetic letters telling him that she loved him & wanted him alone, & not his money or belongings, & that he was her life & joy & comfort, & that she would get her sister or any other girl married to him as second wife, in addition to herself, & that he might live happily, enjoying jollily with both his wives, & that she would give him whatever money he wanted taut that he should not marry a Hindu girl as he was intending to do. She wanted him to see the fair girl she was choosing for him as second wife & also to be with her for 24 hours in a hotel room. She added that she did not know before marrying him what love was, or what sin & the world were, & that she began realising them all only after marrying him. In spite of all these letters in 1946, & after a temporary reconciliation for some months, & getting a son by her on 27-7-1948, the first accused again went away from her in the latter half of 1948 & married P. W. 11, Sarojini, the daughter of A 3 & a Hindu, on 3-2-1949, according to Hindu rites. A 2, the father of A-1, was also present at that marriage. According to P. W. 11, & the other evidence in the case, A 2 & A 3 had never heard of the marriage of the first accused with the petnr. or of his having had sexual intercourse with the petnr., or even of his acquaintance with her, or of his having been baptised & converted to Christianity. The evidence of P. Ws. 1 & 2, to the contrary, was held, rightly, to be false by the lower Ct. The lower Ct. discharged A. 2 & A3 on the facts as it was satisfied that they knew nothing about his first marriage & had not been present at the second marriage of the first accused with knowledge of such first marriage & with intent to abet an offence of bigamy. Regarding the first accused, the lower Ct. held that he too should be discharged as the evidence of P. W. 11, the second wife of the first accused, showed that he, a native convert to Christianity, having married P. W. 1, the petnr., according to, Christian rites in a church, had relapsed to Hinduism & exercised his right as a Hindu to enter into another (polygamous) marriage with P. W. 11. P. W. 11 had sworn that the first accused was observing only Hindu festivals & Hindu customs, & was not observing any Christian festivals or customs, & that she had married the accused according to Hindu rites. She was a girl of 17, & was not shaken in cross-examination, & her evidence was rightly accepted by the lower Ct.

(3.) The learned counsel for the petnr., Mr. Gopala Menon, did not seriously contest before me the correctness of the discharge of accused 2 & 3 as they were not proved to have had any knowledge of the first marriage of the first accused with the petnr. & to have been present with such knowledge at the second marriage of the first accused with P. W. 11. So the petn. is dismissed against accused 2 & 3 (resps. 2 & 3 here).