A sessions court in Ahmedabad recently ruled that a rape case cannot be used to compel a man to fulfill his promise of marriage. The court acquitted Bhavesh Patel, a bank employee, who was accused by a married woman of raping her under the false promise of marriage.
The case arose when Patel’s parents disapproved of his decision to marry the woman, as she had two children from a previous marriage. This disagreement took place in 2020, after Patel introduced her to his parents and expressed his desire to marry her. Upon realizing that Patel would not go through with the marriage, the woman filed an FIR under Sections 376 (rape), 420 (cheating), and 506(2) (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), accusing him of raping her after promising to marry her.
The woman, who had been divorced from her first husband in 2017 via a divorce deed on a Rs. 100 stamp paper, claimed that Patel had urged her to end her previous marriage so that they could be together. However, Patel eventually refused to marry her, which led to the allegations against him.
During the trial, the additional sessions judge, Amandeep Sibia, rejected the woman’s accusations, stating that she was not “forced or lured into the relationship” by a false promise of marriage. The court pointed out that her divorce was not legally valid, making any potential marriage between her and Patel impossible.
Furthermore, the court emphasized that the woman, who was 36 years old and a mother of two at the time of the alleged incidents in 2017, was mature enough to understand the situation. “A married woman entering a relationship with the accused cannot claim to have been cheated by a false promise of marriage, especially when no legal divorce had been obtained,” the judge remarked.
The court also noted that Patel had introduced the woman to his parents, who refused to consent to the marriage. In light of these circumstances, the court concluded that Patel had not committed any offense under Section 376 of the IPC. The case was dismissed, and the accused was acquitted.
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