Disha Kapoor v. State of Uttar Pradesh and Others · 2025 INSC 649

The criminal process challenged by the complainant

A wife challenged the High Court's decision to quash proceedings begun on her application under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 after a Magistrate had summoned her husband and his parents. The complaint alleged cruelty, hurt, intimidation and dowry-related offences under the Indian Penal Code, 1860 and the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, while the Supreme Court had to decide whether contradictions across her accounts justified leaving the High Court's order in place.

The original complaint named ten people, including the husband, his parents and several members of the wider family. Having compared the complaint with statements recorded under Sections 200 and 202 of the Code, the Magistrate found contradictions and summoned only the husband and parents, declining process against the additional relatives rather than accepting every name in the initiating account.

The High Court later ended even those remaining proceedings under its inherent power in Section 482. The complainant's Special Leave Petition therefore concerned the High Court's quashing of a case which had already been narrowed by the Magistrate, rather than an initial judicial refusal to summon anybody at all.

The account of alleged mistreatment

The parties accepted that the marriage took place in December 2019, although the complainant said the relationship changed after a senior member of the husband's family died. She described mental and physical harassment, an incident in September 2020 in which she said she was beaten and expelled from the matrimonial home, and a renewed attempt to return the following month which she said ended in another expulsion.

She also alleged that, when she and her mother visited in December 2021, family members abused and threatened them while demanding Rs. 50 lakh and a Fortuner vehicle before she would be permitted to resume cohabitation. Her account included earlier reports to police, one of which she said had been withdrawn under pressure, followed by the application which produced the complaint case.

The complainant further referred to influential members of the husband's extended family and alleged that one uncle had threatened that another would shoot her. The judgment recorded that the person said to be the prospective shooter was not among the people arrayed as accused, a distinction between a reported threat and the identity of those against whom process had actually been sought.

Those accusations were serious if established, but their seriousness did not remove the Court's obligation to compare the material on which criminal process had issued. The quashing question in this case turned on inconsistencies between the initiating complaint, the complainant's later statement and an affidavit made in the parallel matrimonial litigation, not on a general view that such allegations are inherently unreliable.

Why the accounts could not be treated as interchangeable

The Supreme Court noted that the application under Section 156(3) attributed the later demand and abuse to several named family members, while the statement under Section 200 specifically assigned the demand for cash and the vehicle to a cousin. That same statement did not contain the asserted expulsion from the matrimonial home in September 2020, although the earlier account had presented it as an important episode.

The Court also examined the claim of a hand fracture said to have resulted from physical violence. It found no treatment record supporting that particular allegation and described the assertions of physical and mental torture as vague on the material placed before it, treating the absence of medical support as part of this record rather than announcing a rule that every assault complaint must have such a document before proceedings can continue.

The complainant had spoken of a later visit to the home after the first alleged expulsion and of a further attempt to return with her mother. The Court read the chronology beside the shifting descriptions of who had acted and what had occurred, since the contrast affected whether the accusation against the remaining respondents could be allowed to continue despite the Magistrate's earlier recognition of inconsistencies.

She also said that information had been given to a senior officeholder of the Women Commission, but the Court found no record of a proper written complaint there. It considered that absence alongside the differences in her recorded versions, without treating it as a standalone finding that every allegation made about the matrimonial home was false.

The matrimonial affidavit and the limited use made of it

In an affidavit filed in the Family Court proceedings, the complainant described the early married life as cordial and recorded a cheque from the husband in October 2020 for festive purchases. She also described buying an expensive saree for the festival, statements concerning a period after the date on which she had said she was expelled and after the attempted return on which she had said the family again turned her away.

The husband had sought annulment under Section 12 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, while the complainant had sought restitution of conjugal rights under Section 9. Both matters received a common Family Court judgment, with an appeal said to remain pending, and the Supreme Court deliberately refused to examine disputed facts from that family case in a way that might affect the appeal.

That restraint did not prevent the Court from noticing the complainant's own affidavit when assessing whether the criminal versions were consistent. It kept the merits of the annulment and restitution proceedings outside its decision, focusing instead on the specific harassment and dowry accusations which had supported the criminal complaint.

Why Section 482 relief survived the appeal

The High Court had relied on the risk of involving extended family members in matrimonial prosecutions without adequate support and on the need to stop an abuse of judicial process. The Supreme Court did not treat the presence of relatives as an automatic ground for quashing, particularly since the Magistrate had already screened out seven named persons, but examined the discrepancies that remained even in the case against the three people summoned.

An effort by the Supreme Court to settle the wider dispute failed, leaving the legal challenge to be decided on its merits. It concluded that the contrary stands taken by the complainant and the inconsistencies between her complaint and statement made continuation of these proceedings an abuse of process, so it found no reason to overturn the High Court's use of Section 482.

The Special Leave Petition was dismissed, leaving the High Court's quashing order effective. The decision is therefore tied to the particular record and the Court's comparison of the complainant's versions, while the pending matrimonial appeal and the truth of issues reserved to that forum were not decided by the dismissal.