New Delhi: The supreme court has cautioned against the misuse of anti-dowry provisions to implicate innocent persons for settling scores. The apex court said the provisions relating to anti-dowry measures had been enacted to check the menace of dowry harassment but the same should not be used for harassing the husband or in-laws. “Section 498A IPC (harassment of women) was introduced with the avowed object to combat the menace of dowry deaths and harassment to a woman at the hands of her husband or his relatives.

Nevertheless, the provision should not be used as a device to achieve oblique motives,” a bench of Justices Ashok Bhan and D K Jain observed. The bench passed the observations while partly allowing the appeal filed by in-laws of a woman, Neetu, who alleged harassment for dowry by the husband and other family members. C

ases under IPC sections 498A (harassment of woman) and 406 (breach of trust) were registered against the husband Ashutosh Mishra, father-inlaw Onkar Nath Mishra and the former’s sister. Neetu alleged that the husband and in-laws took away her stridhan (property given by her relatives) and harassed her for additional dowry. The apex court noted that there was no material evidence to prove the ‘stridhan’ was taken away.

Moreover, it noted that there was no material evidence to prove that the father-in-law and the sister-in-law had subjected Neetu to harassment for dowry. Hence it quashed the charges levelled against the in-laws with the observations. However, the apex court upheld the charge under Section 498A levelled against the husband and asked the trial court to proceed with the trial uninfluenced by its observations.

Source : DNAIndia