Husband's Request To Father-in-Law For Money To Arrange Job With Assurance Of Repayment Not 'Dowry Demand' : Orissa High Court

The Orissa High Court has held that a request for a sum of money by the husband to his in-laws for arranging a job for himself, which he assured to repay, will not amount to demand of ‘dowry’ as per Section 2 of the Dowry Prohibition Act.

The Single Bench of Justice Sangam Kumar Sahoo was hearing an appeal filed a person accused of committing murder of his wife in connection with demand of dowry and accordingly, he was charged under Sections 302/498A/304B of the IPC and Section 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act.

The trial Court found the appellant guilty under Sections 498A/304B but acquitted him from the charge of murder under Section 302 of the IPC. Being aggrieved by the order of conviction, the appellant preferred the jail criminal before the High Court.

Court’s Observations

The Court, at the outset, delved to decide as to whether the appellant is liable under Section 304B of the IPC. It noted that one of the ingredients required under the said provision is that the death of the woman must have occurred within seven years of marriage. Thus, that requirement was found to be met in the instant case.

Second requirement under the above provision is that the death ought to have happened otherwise than under normal circumstances. In other words, it requires that the woman must have died of unnatural reasons or the nature of her death should have been homicidal/suicidal.

After analyzing the medical evidence on record, the Court came to the conclusion that the trial Court has rightly come to the conclusion that the death of the deceased was otherwise than under normal circumstances.

Father of the deceased woman, the star witness on behalf of the prosecution, deposed that he had given ₹7000/- to the appellant at the time of the marriage and had assured to give a gold chain to the appellant later. However, due to his poor financial condition, he could not fulfill his promise and for that reason, torture was meted out to the deceased by the appellant.

The father of the deceased also proved some of the letters and applications written by him to the Panchayat for resolution of the dispute between the deceased and the appellant. However, he did not mention anything about demand of dowry by the appellant in those letters.

In another letter, proved by the father of the deceased, the appellant had asked for ₹15,000/- for his service and had assured to repay the same. The Court found the letters very important for coming to a just conclusion in the case in hand and observed:

“It is aptly said that "men may tell lies, but circumstances do not.” Human agency may be faulty in expressing picturisation of actual incident, but the circumstances cannot fail.”

The Court relied upon the decisions of the Supreme Court in the cases of Appa Sahed & Anr. v. State of Maharastra and Vipin Jaiswal v. State of A.P. wherein the Court had held that demand for money on account of some financial stringency or for meeting some urgent domestic expenses or for purchasing manure cannot be termed as a demand for dowry.

After perusing the letters, the Court was of the view that there is nothing written against the conduct of the appellant rather it shows a cordial relationship between the appellant and the deceased and the deceased and her in-laws family members.

“In the case in hand, the request for arranging money for getting a job was not there at the time of marriage. It was also assured by the appellant to repay such amount as soon as possible. There is nothing on record as to when these two letters Exts.5 and 8 were written. In my humble view, this request of money by the appellant to arrange a job for himself cannot come within the definition of ‘dowry’ as per section 2 of the Dowry Prohibition Act,” the Court held.

Thus, the Court was unable to come to the conclusion that cruelty was in fact meted out to the deceased by the appellant in connection with demand of dowry. It held that there must be a proximate link in existence between the facts of cruelty in connection with the demand of dowry and the death.

“…there is lack of clinching evidence regarding demand of a gold necklace from the side of bridegroom and that since such demand was not fulfilled, in connection with such demand, there was torture to the deceased by the appellant,” it added.

However, the Court was of the view that one of the letters exhibited on behalf of the prosecution revealed certain acts/conducts of the appellant which had potential to drive the deceased to commit suicide.

As a result, the Court acquitted the appellant of the charge under Section 304B but upheld his conviction under Section 498A of the IPC.

Case Title: Bhanu Charan Pradhan v. State of Odisha

Case No: CRA No. 10 of 2001

Date of Judgment: November 02, 2023

Counsel for the Appellant: Mohammed Faradish, Advocate

Counsel for the State: Mr. Priyabrata Tripathy, Addl. Standing Counsel

Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (Ori) 114

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