AJAY KUMAR MEHRA Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE compendium of the facts and material, which needs a necessary mention for the limited purpose of deciding the instant petition for anticipatory bail and emanating from the record, is that the engagement ceremony of complainant Gori Mehra, daughter of late Pawan Kapoor (for brevity "the complainant") was solemnized with petitioner Ajay Kumar Mehra on 26.7.2011 at M.K. Hotel, Amritsar. Besides the other dowry articles, an amount of Rs. 51,000/ - was stated to have been given to him at that time. The marriage between them was solemnized on 20.11.2011. Soon after the marriage, the accused have started demanding dowry articles and the father of complainant told them that he was going to Delhi for treatment and on return, he would fulfill their demands. As luck would have been, on 2.1.2012, her father had expired. According to the complainant, after the death of her father, the petitioner -husband and his other co -accused started taunting her on the ground that she had brought sub -standard and insufficient dowry, which were not according to their status and asked her to exchange the dowry articles with new one. One FD of Rs. 2,50,000/ - was given to the accused in this regard, but still, they were not satisfied and started demanding cash, gold ornaments and luxury car. The father -in -law of complainant is alleged to have an evil eye on her. All the accused started maltreating, taunting, abusing and beating her after the birth of her daughter. Ultimately, she was turned out of her matrimonial home.

(2.) LEVELING a variety of allegations and narrating the sequence of events in detail in the FIR, in all, the complainant claimed that the petitioner -husband and his parents (other co -accused) have demanded the dowry articles, luxury car, taunted, harassed, abused, tortured and treated her with cruelty in connection with and on account of demand of dowry. In the background of these allegations and in the wake of complaint of the complainant, the present case was registered against the petitioner and his parents, vide FIR No. 16 dated 17.5.2013 (Annexure P1), on accusation of having committed the offences punishable under Sections 498 -A, 406 & 120 -B IPC by the police of Police Station Women Cell, City Amritsar, in the manner depicted here -in -above.

(3.) AFTER hearing the learned counsel for the petitioner, going through the record with his valuable help and after considering the entire matter deeply, to my mind, there is no merit in the present petition in this context.