Delhi High Court Holds Special Evening Sitting, Grants Bail To Film Director Falsely Accused Of Rape

The Delhi High Court today ordered release of film director Sanoj Mishra, falsely accused of rape by a woman with whom he had a consensual relationship.Justice Girish Kathpalia held a special evening sitting after a Full Court reference on the occasion of superannuation of Justice Dharmesh Sharma, “keeping in mind the issue of liberty of the accused”.Traditionally, after a Full Court Reference, courts are not held.However, since the prosecution had filed a status report indicating that the complainant had admitted that she had lodged a false complaint against the accused, the bench took up the matter at 4.30 pm.Mishra was arrested on March 30 in connection with offences alleged under Section 376 (rape), 354C (voyeurism), 313 (causing miscarriage without consent), 323 (hurt) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of IPC.It was alleged that he committed repeated acts of sexual exploitation, blackmailing and rape against the complainant, who was an aspiring actress.The accused however denied the allegations and claimed that he and the prosecutrix were in a live-in relationship for a long time.The Prosecutor had earlier sought time to investigate the genuineness of the complainant's statements and in pursuance of the same, a status report was filed today.The complainant also filed an affidavit admitting that she was living in relationship with the accused and had established physical relations with him with consent but had lodged the complaint under influence of his rivals.Hearing this, the Court granted bail to the accused, stating,“This is yet another case, reflecting the recent trend of lodging false complaints of sexual offences. Every false complaint of sexual offences not just causes immense damage to the person accused of the offence, but also creates cynicism and distrust across the society, which leads to even the genuine victims of sexual offences suffer, as society starts suspecting her truthful complaint also to be false. Such false complaints have to be dealt with sternly.”The Court has been assured that the process for registration of FIR against the complainant and all those persons who conspired to lodge a false complaint has been initiated.Appearance: Mr. Amit Chadha, Senior Advocate with Mr. Hirein Sharma, Mr. Aamir Chaudhary, Mr. Hayas Singh, Mr. Sarthak Sethi and Ms. Sakshi Yadav, Advocates for Petitioner; Mr. Nawal Kishore Jha, APP for State with SHO Ashish Singh Dalal and SI Shruti Dubey, PS Nabi Karim for State; Complainant/Prosecutrix in person. Case title: Sanoj Kumar Mishra v. State Of Nct Of Delhi And AnrCitation: 2025 LiveLaw (Del) 643Case no.: BAIL APPLN. 1672/2025Click here to read order

Delhi High Court Holds Special Evening Sitting, Grants Bail To Film Director Falsely Accused Of Rape

Kapil Dhyani

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