NEELAM DEVI Vs. KAILASH NATH TRIPATHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ON a complaint filed by Kailash Nath Tripathi, opposite party No. 1, in the court of Special Judicial Magistrate, 1st Class, Allahabad, the learned Magistrate has summoned the applicant No. 1 under Section 494, IPC and applicants Nos. 2 and 3 under Sections 494/114, IPC. By means of this application under Section 482, CrPC, the applicants have cLalmed that the proceedings constitute an abuse of the process of the court and ought to be quashed.

(2.) THE learned counsel for the applicant contended that the applicant No. 1 is a divorced wile of opposite party No. 1, but even assuming that the marriage between them still subsists, the present complaint is not maintainable, because there is no allegation that applicant No. 1 has married another person. He is right, it is an important ingredient of an offence under Section 494 IPC that the accused should have married another person during the subsistence of the first marriage. THEre is not a whisper in the complaint that applicant no. i has married another person. Ail that is stated therein is that applicant no. 1 is living like a wife with Raja, applicant no. 2, and that she has illegal connections with him and several other persons and has even begotten a child through Raja. That is not the same thing as saying that applicant no. 1 has married applicant no. 2. In these circumstances, the learned Magistrate was not justified in summoning the accused. THE proceedings taken by him on the complaint clearly constitute an abuse of the process of the court and must be quashed.