RAMESH VENKAT PERUMAL Vs. STATE OF A P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This petition is filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C. to quash the proceedings in CC No.9471996 on the file of the XXII Metropolitan Magistrate, Hyderabad.

(2.) The facts in giving rise to the filing of this petition are, briefly, as follows : The petitioner is facing trial for an offence under Section 498A of IPC on the charge- sheet filed by Inspector of Police, Women Police Station, C.I.D., Hyderabad on the complaint given by his wife, Smt. Divya Ramesh. It'is alleged that her marriage with the petitioner was performed on 14-2-1994 at Sathya Sai Nigamagamam, Hyderabad, and after marriage they went to Madras and Tirupathi and thereafter left to Arlington, U.S.A. It is further alleged that she was subjected to harassment, humiliation and torture during her short stay at Madras as well as U.S.A. and when she refused to accept the request of the petitioner to terminate her pregnancy, she was dropped at Dallas Air Port penniless and she returned back to India with the assistance of her aunty and on account of the humiliation and mental agony she suffered miscarriage at Hyderabad.

(3.) The learned Counsel for the petitioner submitted that even according to the allegations mentioned in the charge-sheet, she was subjected to harassment while she was in U.S.A. and as the offence was committed outside India, no such offence shall be enquired into or tried in India, except with the prior sanction of the Central Government, as provided under Section 188 Cr.P.C. and admittedly no such sanction was obtained by the Investigating Agency to prosecute the petitioner and hence, the proceedings in CC No.94/96 on the file of the XXII Metropolitan Magistrate, Hyderabad are liable to be quashed, and he relied on Somasundaram Pillai and Another v. Kanakasabai Pillai and Another, AIR 1935 Madras 327; Re M.L. Varghese, AIR 1947 Mad 352 and State v. Om Prakash Saligram, 1966 Crl.LJ. 366.