The Supreme Court quashed a POCSO FIR against a minor boy’s paternal aunt in a custody-linked family dispute. It said such cases can be misused to target in-laws and criticised the high court for not examining the record.
The Supreme Court has expressed concern over in-laws being drawn into cases arising from marital disputes and children being used to target family members, while quashing a POCSO case filed against the paternal aunt of a minor boy. The case came up against the backdrop of a bitter matrimonial dispute between the child’s divorced parents.
A bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and K Vinod Chandran also criticised the Bombay High Court for refusing to quash the case without examining the material on record. The court said there was no reason to subject the woman to trial and ordered that no further proceedings be taken on the FIR.
In its order dated July 23, the bench said, “It is commonplace, nay customary that in-laws are dragged in to settle scores in cases arising out of marital discord and often children are used to vilify each other. But we are shocked by the allegations raised herein by the divorced mother that her son is constantly molested sexually by his paternal aunt.” The court said the FIR appeared to be a counterblast to another FIR lodged earlier by the divorced father, which contained an equally serious allegation against the maternal uncle involving the boy’s twin sister.
The court referred to the divorce decree of September 2023, passed by mutual consent, and noted that the appellant was the paternal aunt of the twins born to the couple. It recorded that the children were in the father’s custody, with visitation rights at the mother’s home. The mother alleged that her son had complained of sexual harassment even when she was living in her matrimonial home, and that she had witnessed one such incident herself. However, the court noted that no such allegation was raised during the divorce proceedings and no complaint was made before the FIR filed on March 17, 2024, just hours after the father lodged a similar FIR.
The bench said the FIR, on a plain reading, did not inspire confidence. Advocate Sana Raees Khan, appearing for the appellant, argued that the prosecution was a classic abuse of the criminal justice process and had been launched only to settle personal scores in a custody battle. She said the allegations surfaced only after the father filed an FIR against the maternal side of the family, showing that the complaint was a retaliatory counterblast rather than a genuine disclosure of child sexual abuse. Khan also submitted that the allegations were belated and contradicted by the statement of the child victim recorded before the Judicial Magistrate under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. She told the bench that the existence of rival FIRs could not dilute the court’s duty to independently examine whether the allegations in a case disclosed a prima facie offence.
The Supreme Court said the high court’s division bench had initially stayed the proceedings after finding, on a perusal of the records, that the mother’s complaint lacked substance. It also noted, “It was also specifically noticed that the statement of the victim boy recorded under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code by the Judicial Magistrate of the First Class indicates that no assault as stated by the de-facto complainant had been occasioned.” The top court said the bench that later heard the matter ought to have examined the records, especially when an earlier bench had, even in an interim order, found that the allegations could not prima facie stand.
